News
Mayor Richard M. Daley will travel with a delegation of Chicago’s business & cultural leaders to Shanghai, China and Busan & Seoul, Korea from September 18-24 as part of an economic development trip to highlight Chicago as a premier global business and tourist destination. The trip is sponsored by the Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce and World Business Chicago.
Mayor Richard M. Daley came together with Chicago’s technology leaders, pledging their continued commitment to making Chicago the top destination for technology business. At a press conference at the home to many of Chicago’s recent technology successes, the Mayor announced the creation of the Mayor’s Committee on Technology Infrastructure.
NAVTEQ Corporation is the leading global provider of maps, traffic and location data around the world. Founded in Silicon Valley, NAVTEQ relocated its headquarters to the Chicago area in the 1990s, taking advantage of the city's central location. In this video, CEO, Larry Kaplan talks about how this multi-national company benefits from being headquartered in Chicago.
James Hardie, the world's leading manufacturer of fiber-cement building materials, recently selected Chicago for its new North American headquarters.
Chicago has been thrust into the cinematic spotlight once again as the cast and crew of Transformers 3 spend the summer filming downtown. Projects like this draw thousands of people, creating significant economic benefits, and furthering Chicago’s cultural cachet. Additionally, the city offers hundreds of other cultural and recreational events during the summer, which also provide a major source of entertainment and a boost the economy.
World Business Chicago tracks indicators from month to month to gauge the strength of several aspects of Chicago’s regional economy. Here are some Key trends evident this month.
The Chicago Fed National Activity Index (CFNAI), a measure of how the national economy is faring relative to its historical trend rate, improved to 0.00 in July from -0.70 in June.
Whether you are an activist, an employee, an entrepreneur, or a business owner, if you are leading Chicago towards a greener future, you can apply for a 2010 GreenWorks Award.
Small businesses that create new jobs between July 1, 2010 and June 30, 2011 may be able to take advantage of a $2,500 tax credit for new hires, under The Illinois Small Business Job Creation Tax Credit.
Preliminary June 2010 unemployment rates for all Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSAs).
Standard & Poor’s Case-Shiller Home Price Index, which tracks the prices of existing single-family homes, showed two consecutive months of increased prices in the Chicago metropolitan area between May and June 2010.
The Chicago Fed Midwest Manufacturing Index (CFMMI), an index of manufacturing output based on hours worked in major industries in the Midwest region (IL, IN, IA, MI, WI), showed an increase of 13.2% from a year ago.
Chicago Fed National Activity Index, a measure of how the national economy is faring relative to its historical trend rate, showed economic contraction in June.
Data on home sales and median prices from the Illinois Association of Realtors. June 2009 marked the 10th consecutive month of year-over-year sales gains in Chicago.
Recently, Chicago has won many accolades for being an international business center: the only US "global destination city" based on investment according to IBM, #1 in Foreign Direct Investment Strategy by fDi and one of PriceWaterhouseCoopers’ Global Cities of Opportunities for its leadership in business, finance and culture.
Attracting recent graduates is essential to a city’s economic development efforts. As a part of WBC’s talent attraction efforts, we’ve created Make Your Mark: 10 Reasons Recent Grads Choose Chicago. WBC's summer intern, Whitney Barlow, who is majoring in American Studies at Yale gives us her insightful perspective on the report.
Each quarter, WBC tracks companies that have relocated to, or expanded in, Chicago. This edition of Chicago Keeps Growing highlights companies from a wide array of industries – from financial services to manufacturing – that have announced the expansion of operations in the city since March.
In May, the Chicago region added more than 50,000 jobs and saw its unemployment rate decrease to 10.3 from May 2009’s rate of 10.4 and April 2010’s 10.7. Additionally, the Chicago Manufacturing Index continued to rise, reaching 86.7 in May. Consumer Confidence showed an annual again of nearly 8 points between May 2009 and May 2010.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics preliminary June 2010 unemployment figures for the 50 states (and Washington, DC), as well as 4 Census Regions and 9 Census Divisions. Unemployment rates in Chicago and the surrounding state and region continued to fall from a March 2010 peak.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics June 2010 figures for the Consumer Price Index, a common measure of inflation.
