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 The Business of Pittsburgh
April 9, 2000 By Douglas Heuck, Post-Gazette Benchmarks Editor
Today marks the launch of the first of several new business section features this year: The Business of Pittsburgh. This new product has three components. The first is our look at the best-performing publicly traded companies in Pittsburgh in five categories: return on equity, profit growth, stock price growth, market capitalization and revenue growth. The top 10 companies in each category can be found, as well as this year's overall winner FreeMarkets Inc. The second component is a familiar one, PG Benchmarks, in which the Post-Gazette measures metro Pittsburgh with 14 similar-sized regions in economy and innovation. This edition looks at the most current performance of the 15 metropolitan areas in 16 benchmark categories. The roundtable discussion features a group of business school students who see a great deal of opportunity in Pittsburgh. Five of the six have committed to jobs that will keep them in the area after graduation. Their views on Pittsburgh, the value of the offers they received, and the future they see are eye-openers. This edition marks the beginning of the fifth year of PG Benchmarks, and the interactive chart below gives you a view of which way the six-county metro area is moving economically compared with the other regions. If you're a fan of population growth, the main driver of economic growth, then you won't like the migration and population growth numbers. As other regions grow, Pittsburgh continues to lose population. From there, the news gets better. For example, in the number of new and expanded facilities and factories -- Pittsburgh has moved from the middle of the pack to fifth. And while Pittsburgh's 1.4 percent annual rate of job growth is still low compared with the other regions, taking the five-year view shows a steady and sustained growth pattern, shared only by San Diego and Seattle. A similar but more dramatic pattern can be found in early-stage venture capital. Where Pittsburgh was 14th in 1995 with $600,000 and one recipient company, it was 9th last year with $59 million and 14 companies receiving funding. One particularly bright spot is University Research and Development, in which Pittsburgh rates second behind Denver in research dollars spent per working-age resident. That research is what is expected to lead to the breakthroughs and new businesses that will sustain the region in the future. The other characteristic of the Pittsburgh economy that gives economists hope is its relatively good performance in productivity -- the key to continued expansion and prosperity. An analysis of productivity as well as the forecasts for the year from three economists can be found in the links below. We also report on a new scholastic initiative spawned by PG Benchmarks that is under way in 65 middle schools in Western Pennsylvania -- Junior Benchmarks, which gives students the opportunity to learn more about their home municipality and Greater Pittsburgh and how to improve both. Finally, the Post-Gazette's business reporters investigate the trends and prospects in 10 of the industry sectors that make up "The Business of Pittsburgh."
 Business school students say Pittsburgh is starting to humProsperity, fueled by rising productivity, shows no signs of waningJunior Benchmarks under way in 65 middle schoolsComparative standings in economy and innovation: A chart
Listed below is a series of charts displaying data on various economic measurements: As with previous benchmarks, this section ranks the benchmark cities in order from 1 to 15 in various categories. Our interactive benchmark charts enable you to see the rankings of a particular category for all of our benchmarks cities or compare two cities to each other.
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