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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.
Childcare Facility Financing: Perspectives from Three Decades of Supporting Childcare Centers
As part of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago’s Spotlight on Childcare and the Labor Market, this article focuses on the ways in which the lack of access to childcare is a barrier to employment in the Seventh District. We spoke with Joe Neri, CEO of IFF, a community development financial institution (CDFI) that has served the Midwest childcare sector for more than 30 years.
How Is the Challenge of Finding Childcare Affecting Labor Force Participation? Perspectives from Employers Across the Seventh District
Through the Chicago Fed Survey of Economic Conditions (CFSEC) and during roundtable discussions with business, nonprofit, and government leaders, the Chicago Fed asked employers from a variety of sectors for their perspectives on how childcare access has affected labor force availability.1 These survey and roundtable findings contribute to the Chicago Fed’s Spotlight on Childcare—an effort to increase our understanding of how the lack of access to childcare impedes labor force participation in the Seventh Federal Reserve District. In this article, we summarize the responses from over 100 ...
Journal Article
Measuring Small Business Financial Health
Throughout the Great Recession and continuing into the recovery, small businesses have played an important role in creating jobs and stabilizing communities. Stories of small business owners overcoming obstacles to provide valuable services and employment are highlighted regularly by pundits, politicians and policymakers alike. However, little attention has focused on the question of what drives the financial health of these often young, often very small businesses.
Journal Article
Financial Well-being: At the Convergence of People and Place – Reflections from a Chicago Conversation
This brief collection of writings is based on a convening, hosted by the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, to have a local conversation about financial well-being. This gathering was motivated by ?What It?s Worth,? a joint publication of the Corporation for Enterprise Development (CFED) and the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, collecting insights from thought leaders across the country on the topic of financial capacity for families and communities.
Newsletter
Dealing with the impact of manufacturing job losses in the Midwest
The Community Development and Policy Studies division (CDPS) of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago hosted the Industrial Cities Initiative Symposium (ICI) on February 28, 2012. More than 50 economists, development professionals, city representatives, and analysts from business, academia, and city government attended the symposium.
Journal Article
Introducing, Understanding, and Using the ICI 300 Peer Cities Identification Tool
Municipalities, especially those that are mid-sized or smaller, often face significant challenges in providing services and amenities to meet the needs of their diverse and changing populations. Solutions are usually context-specific and must factor in larger demographic and economic trends, in order to be effective. And, yet, in spite of contextual differences, cities frequently have meaningful similarities. However, identifying peer cities is often informed more by conversation than by data or evidence.
Journal Article
Exploring the Correlations between Health and Community Socioeconomic Status in Chicago
Much research demonstrates that where you live ? and the socioeconomic conditions present in that place ? determine individual-level health outcomes.[1] The premise that individual stressors tend to aggregate themselves into communities with poor socioeconomic status (SES) leads to the conclusion that ?where you live determines how long you live.? As former Federal Reserve Chairman Bernanke stated, ?Factors such as educational attainment, income, access to healthy food and the safety of a neighborhood tend to correlate with individual health outcomes in that neighborhood.?[2] These factors ...
Journal Article
Preliminary Findings from Focus Groups on Economic Inclusion in Smaller Cities
A growing body of work by the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago and partners points to challenges that "legacy cities" face in extending economic opportunity to all residents. This article reports findings from a series of focus groups conducted around the 7th District to better understand what city leaders are doing to advance positive labor market outcomes for residents.
Journal Article
Looking for Progress in America's Smaller Legacy Cities: A Report for Place-based Funders
Place-based funders2 can play an important role in connecting economic growth to economic opportunity. Looking for Progress in America's Smaller Legacy Cities describes a study tour undertaken by representatives from four Federal Reserve Banks and more than two dozen place-based funders, under the auspices of the Funders? Network-Federal Reserve Philanthropy Initiative. What began as an inquiry into four small legacy cities ? Chattanooga, TN; Cedar Rapids, IA; Rochester, NY; and Grand Rapids, MI ? that appeared to have experienced some measure of revitalization in the post Great Recession ...