RESEARCH

A healthy neighborhood develops and deploys its assets into the regional economy that, in turn, maximizes investment in all of its assets in order to sustainably grow.

Prepared by:
Board of Commissioners of Cook County

June 2017

Summary/What and why

Neighborhoods do not have economies: they have people, business, real estate, and other assets that participate in larger markets, most often regional in scale. A healthy neighborhood develops and deploys its assets into the regional economy that, in turn, maximizes investment in all of its assets in order to sustainably grow. Neighborhoods and regions thus succeed, or fail, together by recognizing and leveraging their connections, from local workforce to regional labor markets, business to industrial supply chains, and so forth. In this time of global economic transformation (to the “knowledge” or “next” economy), neighborhoods and regions must find a linked path toward prosperity.