Portland-metro* is Oregon’s largest community, and its economic health impacts the economy of the entire state. Because of its central role, the five organizations sponsoring this report decided to take a careful look at the health of the Portland economy in a number of studies to identify the region’s strengths and weaknesses. This report contains the findings of the first of those studies.
Portland-metro has many economic assets: a strategic location on the Pacific Rim, a robust transportation system, a relatively low cost of living and a quality of life that is attractive to young, well educated individuals. Over the past four decades, however, Portland-metro’s economic performance has not kept pace with a number of its peers across the nation, and the differences have become most stark over the last decade. For example, where we were once virtually an economic twin to Seattle, our falling incomes now make us more like Pittsburgh and Cleveland. In the late-1990s the region’s wages and income declined relative to peers like Denver, Minneapolis and Seattle. What happened, and how do we fix it?
This report is a call to action for all Oregonians. We must recognize that our valued quality of life will erode if the region’s economy does not support healthy family incomes, quality schools and key public services. It is time to make private sector job creation our immediate and top priority.
Oregon and Portland-metro have shown that we can adopt a bold, nation-leading vision and then bring it to reality. We’ve built a world-class public transportation network and created a visionary land-use system. Now we need to focus that innovative ability on the economic crisis facing our region and what is needed to retain the private sector jobs we currently have and create new jobs through growth of existing firms and recruitment of new ones.
Now is the time to start the work and get involved.
* Portland-metro, Seattle-metro, Denver-metro and Minneapolis-metro refer to the Metropolitan Statistical Areas of Portland-Vancouver-Hillsboro, OR-WA MSA, Seattle-Bellevue-Everett MSA, Denver-Aurora MSA, and Minneapolis-St. Paul-Bloomington MSA respectively unless otherwise noted. This report looks at a wide array of data to analyze the economic performance of the Portland metropolitan region. Using an array of data gives us the broadest possible base from which to draw conclusions.