State's Effort To Boost Life Sciences Industry Yielding Few Jobs

Massachusetts is several years into a $1 billion effort to expand the life sciences industry, but so far the state has created only 8,000 jobs.

The state has spent about $300 million over the last four years, mainly to build research centers and life science incubators.

"It has been an unqualified success, to really be able to solidify what was already a strong community, to really catapult us into an undisputed international leadership," said Susan Windham-Bannister, who heads the Massachusetts Life Sciences Center.

Even so, only 4,000 permanent jobs have been created — the rest were in construction. But Windham-Bannister said that does not include companies that are moving here or expanding because of the strength of the cluster.