Economy
The 2011 Gross Metropolitan Product (GMP) of St. Louis was $133.1 billion. That makes St. Louis the 21st highest GMP in the United States. The three largest categories of employment in Greater St. Louis are trade, transportation, and utilities with 249,000 workers, education and healthcare services with 225,000 workers, and professional and business services with 185,000 workers. Greater St. Louis has more than 1.3 million non-farm workers, representing roughly 15 percent of the non-farm workforce of Missouri and Illinois combined. As of May 2011, 125,000 non-farm workers were unemployed in Greater St. Louis, with an unemployment rate of 8.6 percent. As of the third quarter of 2010, the Greater St. Louis region had more than 73,000 companies or establishments paying wages, while average weekly wages for that period were $833, slightly lower than the U.S. national average of $870.
The largest industry by business conducted was wholesaling with $71 billion, followed by manufacturing with $67 billion, retail trade with $36 billion, and healthcare with $16 billion. The area's largest employer by sector was healthcare with 174,000 workers, followed by retail trade with 152,000 workers and manufacturing with 134,000 workers. Using available data, the combined value of business conducted in the combined statistical area was $213 billion in 2007. With a gross metropolitan product of $112 billion in 2009, St. Louis' economy makes up 40% of the Gross State Product of Missouri.
As of 2011, the St. Louis area is home to nine Fortune 500 companies, including Express Scripts, Emerson Electric, Monsanto, Reinsurance Group of America, Ameren, Charter Communications, Peabody Energy, Graybar Electric, and Centene. Other notable corporations from the area include Edward Jones Investments, Scottrade, Wells Fargo Advisors (formerly A.G. Edwards), Energizer Holdings, Ralcorp, Hardee's, and Enterprise Holdings (parent company of several car rental companies). Significant healthcare and biotechnology institutions with operations in St. Louis include Pfizer, the Donald Danforth Plant Science Center, the Solae Company, Sigma-Aldrich, and Multidata Systems International.
Although it was purchased by Belgium-based InBev, Anheuser-Busch continues its presence in the city, as does Mallinckrodt Incorporated in spite of its purchase by Tyco International. The May Department Stores Company (which owned Famous-Barr and Marshall Field's stores) was purchased by Federated Department Stores, but Federated maintained its regional headquarters in the area. General Motors continues to produce cars in the St. Louis area, although Chrysler closed its production facility in the region, which was located in Fenton, Missouri. Despite its purchase by Nestle, Ralston Purina remained headquartered in St. Louis as a wholly owned subsidiary. St. Louis is also home to Boeing Phantom Works (formerly McDonnell-Douglas). In addition, the Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis in downtown is one of two federal reserve banks in Missouri.
St. Louis County in particular is home to several area companies. Monsanto Company, formerly a chemical company and now a leader in genetically modified crops, is headquartered in Creve Coeur. Solutia, the former Monsanto chemical division that was spun off as a separate company, is in Town and Country. Express Scripts, a pharmaceutical benefits management firm, has its corporate headquarters in the suburbs of St. Louis, near the campus of the University of Missouri–St. Louis. Energizer Holdings, the battery company, is headquartered in Town and Country. Enterprise Rent-A-Car's headquarters are located in Clayton. Charter Communications is headquartered in Town and Country. Emerson Electric's headquarters are located in Ferguson. Boeing Integrated Defense Systems is headquartered in Berkeley. Trans States Airlines is headquartered in Bridgeton. Edward Jones Investments is headquartered in Des Peres. From 1994 until its acquisition in 2000 by Tyco International, another chemical company, Mallinckrodt, was headquartered in St. Louis County. Many of the former Mallinckrodt facilities are still in operation by Tyco in the St. Louis suburb of Hazelwood, Missouri. Others are SSM Health Care, St. John's Mercy, and the Tenet Healthcare Corporation chain.
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Famous quotes containing the word economy:
“The basis of political economy is non-interference. The only safe rule is found in the self-adjusting meter of demand and supply. Do not legislate. Meddle, and you snap the sinews with your sumptuary laws.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Wise men read very sharply all your private history in your look and gait and behavior. The whole economy of nature is bent on expression. The tell-tale body is all tongues. Men are like Geneva watches with crystal faces which expose the whole movement.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Even the poor student studies and is taught only political economy, while that economy of living which is synonymous with philosophy is not even sincerely professed in our colleges. The consequence is, that while he is reading Adam Smith, Ricardo, and Say, he runs his father in debt irretrievably.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)