As Detroit continues its recovery from a high-profile bankruptcy, the city’s leaders have taken note of a number of positive trends, including steady job growth and increased real estate values.
One of the busiest companies in the Detroit metro region – a six-county area that includes the Motor City – has been online lender Quicken Loans, which relocated its headquarters from Detroit’s suburbs to the downtown region in 2010. That move brought 1,800 jobs to the city, and several of Quicken Loans’ sister companies have moved into Detroit since then. All told, Quicken Loans and its sister companies employ about 8,000 people in downtown Detroit.
The automotive industry’s rebound has generated much of the recent economic success in the region, and part of Detroit’s rebirth includes beautification efforts. A leader in that realm has been the nonprofit Greening of Detroit. As of early 2016, the organization has provided job training for 350 residents, and it hopes to ultimately certify more than 5,000 workers in urban agriculture, landscape construction and other occupations.
Also of note is a workforce development initiative backed by financial interest JPMorgan Chase. The company’s philanthropic division will spend $100 million over a five-year period in Detroit as part of its “New Skills at Work” initiative. The work will include development of a master plan to train local residents in high-demand, middle-skill occupations and place them in jobs.
To learn more about Detroit and other metro economies, please go to:
Joe Coombs is Senior Analyst, Workforce Trends and Forecasting for the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM). Joe tracks current trends and issues in the labor market including the economy's impact on hiring and recruiting, wages and compensation, retirement benefits and the aging of the work force. In addition to The Jobs Blog, he also writes monthly and bi-annual reports on the labor market using data culled by the research department. Contact him at Joseph.Coombs@shrm.org or on LinkedIn.
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