TAP’s Top 5 Innovative Cities for African-Americans

3.  Los Angeles, California

The state of California has the second largest number of black-owned firms in the U.S., the county of Los Angeles has the second largest number of black-owned firms, and the city of Los Angeles ranks third among cities with black-owned firms, according to the U.S. Economic Census. These numbers are pretty impressive.

As for L.A.’s social brand, need we spell it out? Hollywood. This industry employs plenty of labor from actors to writers to producers to paparrazi. Black Entertainment Television may be based in Washington DC but Los Angeles is definitely representing for black entertainment talent.

Political leadership in Los Angeles falters, as the entire state of California faced crises in the form of I.O.Us and other shocking economic deficits. Still, Los Angeles was the home of the late five-term mayor, Tom Bradley (b. 1917-1998), whose surprising loss in a 1982 gubernatorial race came to be known as the “Bradley effect.” Many voters suspected that, although whites appeared to have favored the African-American Bradley in public, they couldn’t actually bring themselves to vote for him that year.

We do give some political points to students, who in December of 2009 protested in front of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s downtown Los Angeles office, demanding educational reform. However, we subtract points from this city because its average unemployment rate for black men and women registers at 16.5%, according to City-data.com.

Overall Score: 3.375

Entrepreneurship——4.0

Social brand————-5.0

Political Leadership—3.0

Employment————-1.5