A study by Anderson Economic Group, a respected economics research firm commissioned by the University of Chicago to analyze the economic impact of constructing the Barack Obama Presidential Library on Chicago’s South Side, has concluded that the library “can provide a significant economic boon to the neighborhood and the city.”
The report, completed in April 2014, estimated future economic activity exclusively due to the library. This analysis projected the impact of library construction, operations, and visitors on measures including employment, earnings, and tax revenues. Its main findings:
- The annual economic impact to the City of Chicago would be $220 million, due primarily to an increase in visitors to the city. It would create 1,900 permanent new jobs, increasing annual local earnings by $56 million.
- The study estimates that 800,000 visitors will come to the library each year. The visitors would bring additional spending of $31 million on food and retail to the neighborhood near the library, enough to support 30 new restaurants, 11 new retail outlets and a new hotel. Visitors to the city would spend about $110 million in all in the city that would not be spent otherwise.
- Construction of the library would have a $600 million economic impact on the city. It would create 3,280 local jobs for a total of $156 million in earnings over the course of the construction project. The analysis projected that construction alone would cost $380 million. The construction costs plus other indirect expenditures would provide a total of $600 million in economic impact.
