That is not to say that people from India and China are not creative. Patents are hardly the only measure of creativity.
For instance, AnnaLee Saxenian of the University of California, Berkeley, has shown that Indian and Chinese entrepreneurs founded or co-founded roughly 30% of all Silicon Valley startups in the late 1990s, generating $20 billion in annual revenue and about 70,000 jobs.
These particular ideas blossomed as part of the innovative ecosystem in Silicon Valley.
Geographic concentration encourages innovation because ideas flow more freely, are honed more sharply, and can be put into practice more quickly when innovators, implementers, and financial backers are in constant contact.
Creative people cluster not simply because they like to be around one another or prefer cosmopolitan centers with lots of amenities (though both things tend to be true).
They cluster because density brings such powerful productivity advantages, economies of scale, and knowledge spillovers.
Image: The Taj Mahal in Agra. | Photograph: Pedro Ugarte/AFP/Getty Images
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