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Economic Outlook Symposium: summary of 2004 results and forecasts for 2005
The forecasters expect more moderate economic growth during 2005, with some reduction in activity in the housing sector and a slower pace of consumer spending growth than in the past several years.
Newsletter
Economy to turn the corner in 2010
According to participants in the Chicago Fed?s annual Automotive Outlook Symposium, the nation?s economic decline is forecasted to bottom out this year; solid economic growth is expected in 2010?with inflation staying contained but the unemployment rate remaining high. Light vehicle sales are predicted to fall sharply this year and then to improve in 2010.
Journal Article
The Low- and Moderate-income Conditions Survey: A Summary of Seventh Fed District Community Development Practitioner Responses
For the first time, the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago participated in administering the Kansas City Fed?s low- and moderate-income survey to respondents in the Seventh District. The survey is administered on line twice a year to measure ?economic conditions of low- and moderate-income (LMI) populations and the organizations that serve them.?1 A key motivation for the survey is that compliance with the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) entails banking institutions subject to CRA to provide credit, investment, and services, consistent with safe and sound banking practices, to LMI populations ...
Journal Article
Seventh District Workforce Development Programs That Serve Marginalized and Disadvantaged Populations
In 2011, the Community Development and Policy Studies (CDPS) division of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago launched the Industrial Cities Initiative (ICI) to take a close look at 10 former industrial/manufacturing hubs and their economic evolution over the last 50 years.
Journal Article
Residential Mortgage Lending for Underserved Communities: Recent Innovations
As the United States continues to recover from its worst financial crisis since the 1930s, housing finance leaders from both the public and private sectors have diligently worked to develop programs, products, and services to safely expand access to affordable homeownership. Despite persistently low interest rates, relatively modest growth in home prices, and a strengthening labor market, purchase mortgage volume remains low compared to the pre-crisis and pre-bubble years, and the homeownership rate continues to fall. Factors contributing to the homeownership decline include the still ...
Journal Article
From Classroom to Career: An Overview of Current Workforce Development Trends, Issues and Initiatives
Earlier this year, Community Development and Policy Studies (CDPS) staff at the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago released a report on its Industrial Cities Initiative (ICI).[1] The report features a quantitative assessment of ten Midwestern “industrial cities” that is augmented by more than 175 interviews with city leadership. The report explores whether – and to what extent – these cities have been able to withstand a decline in manufacturing employment since the 1960s. Workforce development was the most common and ...
Journal Article
Small Business Credit Survey Are you a small business or do you work with small businesses that would be interested in participating in the 2017 Small Business Credit Survey?
The dual mandate of the Federal Reserve includes maximum employment. Small business development and growth is essential to full employment. "More than half of Americans either own or work for a small business, and they create about two out of every three new jobs in the US each year," according to the Small Business Administration. To learn more about credit access and business conditions for this very large cohort of employers, Community Development and Policy Studies, a department of the Chicago Federal Reserve, is working to engage small businesses through trade, advisory, and other ...
Newsletter
Economic Outlook Symposium: summary of 2008 results and forecasts for 2009
According to participants in the Chicago Fed?s annual Economic Outlook Symposium, the nation?s economic growth in 2009 is forecasted to be very weak, with inflation moving lower and the unemployment rate higher. The housing sector is predicted to remain weak, and light vehicle sales are expected to decline further.
Journal Article
Employment Challenges for the Formerly Incarcerated
The U.S. economy is on a historic run of job creation, with 76 straight months of job growth as of June 2016. Many firms are looking for new pools of talent as traditional pools are increasingly absorbed by rising employment. Wages are beginning to rise more rapidly than they have for several years, with ADP?s Workforce Vitality Report for Q1 2016 estimating annual wage growth for full-time job holders of 4.7 percent. The strengthening labor market provides an opportunity for both employers and policymakers to reconsider the status of subgroups that face distinct barriers to the job market. ...
Journal Article
Industrial cities initiative: working paper summary
"Rust Belt" is an epitaph for cities large and small throughout America's midwestern and northeastern regions. It encapsulates social and economic changes: "population loss, rising crime rates, loss of union jobs particularly in manufacturing, White flights to the suburbs, and a generally declining urban environment," in which massive, but abandoned factories rusted away and scarred the landscape of once vibrant cities.