Houston one of five cities that will rise in the new economy

Houston Strategies
November 30, 2009

The Christian Science Monitor recently named Houston one of five cities that will rise in the new economy, along with Boston, Seattle, Huntsville-AL, and Fort Collins-CO. Not bad company. In fact, they open the main article with us:

In Houston, the Texas Medical Center is expanding so quickly that it will soon become the seventh largest downtown in the US. By itself. The hospital complex brims with restaurants, shops, and hotels, and employs 100,000 people – the population of Billings, Mont.

Later they mention the power of affordable housing to attract young talent. They also have detailed profile article on Houston with some good excerpts:

...Many say the city is poised to do well because of its ties to the global marketplace. Houston is home to NASA, as well as the largest medical complex in the world, the second-busiest port in the nation, and a strong international business sector.

...“To me, Houston is the perfect intersection of old industry stepping up to advance leading-edge industries,” says Vivante’s founder and president, J. David Enloe Jr.

But Houston has much more than energy experience powering its future. It is the largest US port in foreign tonnage and the second largest in total tonnage. (including strong exports)

...

Then there is the Texas Medical Center, which may be Houston’s version of the Great Pyramids, only with windows and an antiseptic smell. More than $3 billion is going into expanding the Med Center’s footprint from 30 million to 40 million square feet – making it larger than the size of the area inside Chicago’s Loop. The complex currently serves up to 65,000 patients a day, says Richard Wainerdi, the CEO.

Still, even with the port, the medical center, and NASA, the petrochemical industry remains the flywheel of the economy – accounting for about half the area’s total output. Eager to be in the vanguard of the New Economy, city officials are trying to redefine Houston as more than just an oil and gas capital. They want it to be an energy capital – including renewables.

Last summer, for example, Houston became the No. 1 municipal purchaser of green power in the nation, with 25 percent of the city’s total electricity load coming from wind energy. (Texas leads the US in wind-energy production.)

The article also includes a couple of nice Houston pictures here and here.

TEXAS BOUND FOR FAST RECOVERY?

Forbes.com & Dallas Urban Core
November 24, 2009

Texas’ four major metros are in the top ten fastest-recovering cities nationwide, according to Forbes magazine.
Forbes ranked San Antonio the second fastest recovering city in the country, Austin the third, Dallas–Fort Worth–Arlington the sixth and Houston–Sugar Land–Baytown the eighth.

The magazine attributed their relatively quick recovery to San Antonio’s and Austin’s high number of municipal jobs, Dallas’ thriving technology industry and Houston’s energy sector, as well as the state housing market’s ability to remain stable while other states’ markets crashed.

“Texas didn’t have as big of a boom,” said Dr. Jim Gaines, research economist at the Real Estate Center at Texas A&M University. “So we’re not having anywhere near the kind of bust.”

El Paso and McAllen-Edinburg-Mission were also placed within the 100 fastest-growing MSAs, ranking 43rd and 48th, respectively.

Forbes ranked the country’s 100 largest MSAs according to each area’s September unemployment rate and foreclosures, gross metropolitan product, home prices and sales rates. Forbes.com

Texas Grass is Indeed Greener than Elsewhere

From: Texas A&M Real Estate Center
July 15, 2009

Despite the recent lack of rain, the “grass” in Texas is much greener than in most states. At least that’s the picture according to the U.S. Census Bureau and recent rankings by Forbes and Business Week.

The combination of rising unemployment, rapid market undulations, stingy credit, diminished home values, and consumer restraint in regard to major purchases has left many Americans finding that the careers and communities with which they have identified themselves for lengthy periods are no longer as economically dependable as they once assumed.

All states have been affected by the national economic downturn, but a handful of states, especially Texas, remain relatively healthy and inviting for those seeking greener pastures.
Geographic mobility has become the password for job-seekers with flexibility in terms of skills, family responsibilities and the marketing of their homes.

According to the online moving-services company, Relocation.com, although the economy has placed a strain on migration to some extent and is causing fewer people than normal to move from place to place, for those able to relocate, Texas is the most popular draw among all states.
Forbes reports that of the top five cities to which Americans are resettling, two are in the Lone Star State — Austin, number two nationally, and Dallas, in fifth place.

The most distinctive characteristic of these locales, as well as the others on the list — Raleigh, Charlotte and Phoenix — is the prevalence of varied business opportunities.
Other qualities shared by those on the list include generally pleasing climate and affordable housing.

Based on a recent study published by Business Week, three Texas metro areas are among the 20 best places in which to start a new career or a new life.

They include Amarillo at number 9, followed by Beaumont-Port Arthur and Waco, at 12 and 14, respectively.

The rankings were based on the percentages of companies that anticipated increasing their employment roles during the third quarter of this year.

There are many other reasons why people want to come to Texas.

According to a survey of CEOs by Chief Executive Magazine, for the fourth year in a row, Texas is the top state in terms of job growth and business development.

Economist Articles on Texas

California v. Texas

Lone Star Rising

Tex-Mix

Beyond Oil

The Red and the Blue

The New Face of America

Lone Star Rising

From: The Economist

July 9, 2009

Thanks to low taxes and light regulation, Texas is booming. But demography will bring profound changes.

VISITORS to Governor Rick Perry’s vast office in the Texas capitol building in Austin (with a dome a mite taller, naturally, than the one in Washington, DC) are sometimes offered a viewing of a triumphalist video. Entitled “The Texaplex”, the seven-minute film is a hymn to the successes Texas has achieved in recent years, and they look pretty impressive.

Texas now hosts more Fortune 500 companies than any other American state. They include AT&T, Dell and Texas Instruments; oil giants such as Exxon Mobil, ConocoPhillips and Valero; American, Continental and Southwest Airlines; Fluor, a huge construction firm (recently lured from California); J.C. Penney; Halliburton; and 52 others. Texas claims to have been responsible for 70% of all the net new jobs created last year in America’s 50 states, though since only a few states created any jobs at all that is not quite as astonishing as it sounds.

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Texas and America's four great growth waves

From houston strategies

April 9, 2009

Let's talk about the really big picture - like 200+ years of American history. It seems to me there have been four great growth waves in our history. In each case, there was an attractive new frontier, which not only drew migrating waves of people seeking new opportunity, but also developed large new bases of industry, wealth, and power.

1. The Boston, NYC, Philadelphia, Baltimore, DC corridor: America's original land of opportunity, wealth, and power. NYC was the big winner, and DC and Boston still do quite well.
2. The rise of the agricultural and industrial Midwest, including Chicago, Detroit, Pittsburgh, Cleveland, and St. Louis. The fall here has been a hard one as manufacturing moved abroad, but Chicago still stands as a world class city produced during the region's heyday.
3. The great westward migration, mostly focused on California, but with ancillary growth in adjacent and west coast states. This migration started well before WW2, but really took off after the war, and produced two top-tier mega-metros, LA and the San Francisco Bay Area, and several successful second-tiers like Seattle, San Diego, Las Vegas, and Phoenix.
   

These waves are not clearly distinct, but overlap each other. As one region starts to level off, the next region is beginning its growth wave. And that's the situation now as California shows clear signs of leveling off: gigantic tech and housing crashes plus economic and domestic outmigration as tax, cost-of-living, housing, and regulation burdens rise.

The fourth wave is increasingly clear: Texas and the new South.

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Keynote Speaker Sees Strong Texas

Keynote Speaker Sees Strong Texas

DALLAS-Though Texas has joined much of the nation in entering the economic downturn, the North Texas Realty Symposium keynote speaker suggested the drivers of the state's economy wouldn't keep it down for long. Todd Staples, the state's Commissioner of Agriculture said that Texas has a diversified economic base, a reputation for jobs creation, and a high GDP.

"If Texas were its own country, it would have the highest GDP per person in the world," Staples told participants at the Appraisal Institute, North Texas Chapter's symposium on May 12. "We're number one in productivity per person, worldwide," he added." ....

By Amy Wolff Sorter with Globest.com