Boeing chooses Chicago

May 10, 2001 10:39 AM

Boeing chooses Chicago for new corporate headquarters. This, despite O'Hare's growing reputation for cancellations and delays, and the gridlocked politics that prevent a near-term solution to the air transportation problems in Chicago.
posted by ktheory (10 comments total)

Whooo! Brown-nosing works!
It's be a nice change though, I mean sure it's be only the corporate offices, but still, it may encourage others.
I've heard their facilities would be on the south side.

Anyway, now, if we could only move the headquarters of mefi to Chicago.
posted by tiaka at 10:46 AM on May 10, 2001

Chicago Mayor Richard Daley and Illinois Governor George Ryan prostituted Chicago (read, massive tax breaks) to convince a giant multinational corporation to set up shop here. Who needs 'em? What do we get? 500 jobs (most likely to be filled by the transplants from Seattle), and another corporation that will constantly be begging for welfare handouts...until they decide one day to leave, as they did in Seatle, without even so much as a heads up to the city. Screw Boeing!
posted by mapalm at 10:48 AM on May 10, 2001

Pity.

Now living in Denver has absolutely no redeeming worth. Time to move elsewhere.
posted by vandoren at 10:56 AM on May 10, 2001

Ktheory, what does the issue of delays at O'Hare have to do with Boeing's choice of Chicago? They didn't move here because of O'Hare, they moved here because they are four hours closer to Wall Street and (I'd guess more importantly) United Airlines will be their (approximately) next door neighbor. Oh, yeah, and there is that multi-million dollar tax break thing (check the numbers; Chicago's offer was the highest of the three). What does Chicago get? Probably a couple of hundred coprorate jobs - mapalm naively declares they are "most likely to be filled by the transplants from Seattle", but Boeing's no more going to pay for two or three hundred low level managers and administrative people to move two thousand miles than they are to establish their corporate headquarters on the Space Station. Plus Chicago gets the marketing benefit of adding Boeing to the list of "Chicago-based global companies" if one subscribes to the theory that like-attracts-like when corporations are evaluating headquarters addresses.
posted by m.polo at 11:36 AM on May 10, 2001

The South Side? Well, maybe they looked at some sites there, but several days ago they narrowed their Chicago locations under consideration to 100 N. Riverside, basically across the river from the Merc and Civic Opera House.

Reagan aside, there is a trickle-down effect: 500 high-wage jobs means roughly $50M going right into the local goods and services economy -- nothing to sniff at.

I don't think it solves anything on its own, really, but it is a good morale boost to a city that was seeing corporate HQs dribble away in failures and mergers, and underlines our strengths in the transportation and business-to-business economy.
posted by dhartung at 11:55 AM on May 10, 2001

My, m.polo...no need to get snooty (mapalm naively declares)...But the fact remains - it's still millions of dollars spent to secure a few hundred corporate jobs, money that could have gone into, oh, say, a jobs program for the residents displaced by the razing of Cabrini Green.

As for more corporations coming here - how exactly does that benefit a city, especially when the actual manufacturing jobs for the people who make stuff will continue to go south, where cheap labor and corporate-friendly governments let entities like Boeing have whatever they want?...Hey, come to think of it - we can now include Chicago in that list as well!
posted by mapalm at 11:55 AM on May 10, 2001

Yay!! We Win!!
posted by aladfar at 12:35 PM on May 10, 2001

Next thing you know, we'll get The Real World!
posted by hijinx at 12:45 PM on May 10, 2001

personally, i hope that Boeing will donate a few of these to deliver a dose of reality to the Real World, Bosnia-style.
posted by donkeysuck at 12:56 PM on May 10, 2001

to hijinx and donkeysuck: thanks for injecting those much needed doses of levity.
posted by mapalm at 1:49 PM on May 10, 2001