ABSTRACT
Chapter 3 explains why planning needs to address the issue of providing enough jobs for the inhabitants of towns and cities and in the countryside. Unfortunately, not only does the nature of employment change over time but planners do not have many tools to control it, apart from allocation of land. Planners do, however, get involved in promoting land-use changes that form part of economic regeneration. They are also in a position to think about employment changes over wide travel to work areas and to jobs in the countryside, ideally with a system of regional planning. Unfortunately, the provision for regional planning has had its ups and downs, from a high point in the late 1960s and early 1970s to its complete absence in the 2010s. However, this does not mean that the regional issues go away, just that there is no structure to deal with them.
