University Research
The city competitiveness report shows the following information:
The City’s Competitiveness Rating of the Industry.
The higher the city’s competitiveness rating, the larger number of people are employed in the local industry. When the city’s competitiveness is weak, it will have to import large volumes of goods, hurting employment in the manufacturing sector.
The Global Competitiveness Rating of the Industry.
When the city’s competitiveness rating exceeds the global competitiveness rating, the city will be in a position to export its products to the worldwide market.
The City’s Volume of Export of the Industry.
There will be export when the city’s competitiveness rating exceeds the global competitiveness rating. Strong export will improve the city’s employment significantly.
1) University Research leads to higher competitiveness to certain industries, boosting the city export of products in those industries. The city’s local businesses benefit from increasing competitiveness and export, thus hiring more workers and decreasing the city’s unemployment rate. A lower unemployment rate and more job openings will attract more people to migrate to the city.
Note that this is not an immediate effect. Only when the city’s competitiveness exceeds the global average when you start to see the result. It may take months or even years. And the impacts will become more obvious when competitiveness of many product classes far exceeding the global average.
2) When an industry’s city competitiveness rating is larger than zero, the game adds a bonus to the Production Quality of all products being produced in the city that are part of the industry. It is displayed as “City Quality Bonus” on the interface of a manufacturing unit.
Effects of Education
The education levels of people in a city affects:
1) How fast a city’s competitiveness in a specific industry increases.
(If you click on the above link button, please scroll down to the “Industries” section to view the details about city competitiveness.)
2) The skill level of the staff in a civic building.
The staff skill level, as shown in the following screenshot, is determined by the education levels of people in this city and the staff training budget for this civic building.
If you are interested in knowing exactly how the mechanism works, here are more details:
For the factor based on the education level, it is determined by the average of the following two values:
1) the percentage of the city’s population with high school education
2) the percentage of the city’s population with university education