While the Holland area may be better known to outsiders for its Dutch heritage and pristine Lake Michigan beaches, the locals know its economy is driven by manufacturing. The area suffered as manufacturing output fell by a third during the Great Recession. Unemployment exceeded 13 percent. But a strong rebound by auto suppliers, office furniture […]
GDP
Posted inBusiness Watch
Mapping Michigan’s growth in 2011
While Michigan has 83 counties and hundreds upon hundreds of communities, when it comes to economics, the only number that really matters is 14. That figure represents the “metropolitan statistical areas” defined by the federal government as cohesive economic units. Those 14 places – sometimes a single county, sometimes multiple counties – account for nearly […]
Posted inBusiness Watch
How did your city’s economy do in 2011?
PICTURE OF PROGRESS: Downtown Grand Rapids and the rest of the Grand Rapids-Wyoming MSA posted a 2.3 percent growth rate in 2011, matching the statewide figure. (Bridge archive photo) The Holland-Grand Haven area had the best 2011 when it came to economic growth in 2011 – at least as it compared to 2010. Still, though, […]
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All Michigan regions grew in 2010
Michigan’s regional economies surged ahead in 2010, propelled by a surprisingly robust manufacturing sector and solid growth from the “information economy.” The latest figures are a positive pivot from a decade that saw most Michigan regions lag economically. Between 2001 and 2009, 11 of 14 Michigan metropolitan areas recorded declines in real gross domestic product […]
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Stomach-churning: Highs and lows in Mich. economy
Michigan has starred in its own disaster movie in the first decade of 21st century. The economic equivalents of F5 tornadoes and magnitude 9 earthquakes have battered the automotive industry and smashed construction work in the state. You knew all that, having lived here. But amid all the destruction there was surprising growth over the […]
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Agriculture's growth real, but not the stuff of myth
Late last winter, Gov. Rick Snyder officially dubbed March 17, 2011, as Michigan Agriculture Day. The proclamation lauds the industry as “the source of virtually everything we eat each day,” and says it plays a “key role in the growth and reinvention of Michigan’s economy.” It’s one of the ways that Snyder has singled out […]
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Economic shockwave flattens construction industry
Bloomfield Park, an abandoned mixed-use real estate project in Oakland County, stands as an eerie symbol of the construction industry’s collapse in Michigan over the past decade. Looking like the bleak setting of a “Mad Max” movie, the planned $2 billion development on Telegraph Road just north of Square Lake Road was to have featured […]
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Scoring the '00s: How Michigan's 14 regions changed
Despite billions of dollars in construction projects on the University of Michigan’s campus and Ann Arbor’s reputation as a high-tech business hotbed, the regional economy there contracted slightly over the past decade. Gross domestic product in the Ann Arbor metro area fell 1 percent between 2001 and 2009 as several major businesses left town. Pfizer […]
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Deep inside the Lost Decade: Decline, transformation and resilience in Michigan's regions
Ann Arbor on the east side and Grand Rapids on the west are widely regarded as the most prosperous and desirable metropolitan areas in Michigan. But Kalamazoo-Portage and Battle Creek in Southwest Michigan surprisingly outpaced Ann Arbor, Grand Rapids and all other metro areas in the state in economic growth over the past decade. An […]
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