2022-12-05
31 分钟Josh thought he’d found a tech utopia — but then reality hit. This is a story about one man’s quest to transform a city, and the world, through his particular vision of happiness. It’s about the people who were seduced by that vision. And the people who were left behind. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
It's 2011.
Barack Obama is in charge of the US.
The Arab Spring is sweeping the Middle east.
People are starting to use a new app called instagram.
And Josh Levine is a student at a small liberal arts college trying to figure out what to do with his life.
I think going into senior year, I wasn't really sure what I wanted to do.
After school, pondering his future, he decides to attend a talk by Andrew Yang you might remember Yang as a 2020 us presidential candidate, but back in 2011, he was an up and coming tech entrepreneur.
He just started a program called Venture for America, and he was in recruitment mode.
Andrew Yang laid out this pitch for smart young people, recent college grads, going to cities that college grads don't typically go to, and working for startups and making a difference.
The idea behind venture for America is to train fresh faced grads to become entrepreneurs in so called emerging american cities, not your New Yorks or Los Angeleses.
The cities at the time were Detroit and Las Vegas and Cincinnati and Providence, Rhode island and New Orleans.
And I think that just really appealed.
To me because thats the sort of place Josh is from.
I love New Haven.
It's a great city to grow up in.
I mean, everything was there.
I grew up in a neighborhood where I was in the minority as a white person, and I felt like I learned and was challenged so much by that experience.
But as a post industrial city, New Haven is also marked by poverty and lack of opportunity.
That's precisely the sort of thing venture for America says is its mission to tackle.
You don't move there because it's popular.