“If Apple Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook wanted to, he could make the Windy City his new corporate headquarters — all of it,” Ryan Vlastelica reports for MarketWatch.
“Technology companies have grown so large that they’ve surpassed the economic value of major American cities, according to data from Bank of America-Merrill Lynch, which compared company market capitalizations to metropolitan gross domestic product,” Vlastelica reports. “At current levels, Apple Inc’s market capitalization of about $803 billion is 38% larger than Chicago, which had a real GDP of $581 billion in 2016. ”
“Apple is less than 4% from surpassing Los Angeles, which had a real GDP of $832 billion last year and was the second-largest city in the country by this metric,” Vlastelica reports. “The iPhone maker is a long way from the top spot, however. Apple would need to grow about 85% for it to top the Big Apple — New York City, whose GDP was an eye-popping $1.483 trillion last year.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: This is an, uh, an apple to oranges comparison, not to mention that the city’s finances are, to be be charitable, on very shaky ground, especially with the Chicago Public Schools system being $596 million in the hole. Granted that not-so-little issue along with many others doesn’t change Chicago’s GDP, but the comparison of a city’s GDP to a company’s market cap is nonsensical regardless.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “botvinnik” for the heads up.]
Chicago is a blight on the state of Illinois and a stain on the republic. I fail to see how the comparison is either legitimate or commendable.
Whatever. Attempting to boil down everything to the dollar is a fool’s game. GDP is one of the stupidest measures of value. It ignores the value of investments like education and recreation while attributing great value to waste like traffic accidents, litigation, brokerage and other money makers that are usually not productive work.
Anyone who has ever visited Chicago knows it is headquarters to many world class companies, universities, and cultural icons.
But since Botty has nothing to do but to attack anything he personally doesn’t understand or appreciate, let everyone see that his list shows Chicago is ranked more valuable than Houston or Dallas — two of the largest cities in Texas.
So MDN wants to criticize Chicago for working through its budget problems. Well, people in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones. Republican communities ain’t pretty with education funding either. The Houston Independent School District passed a $1.9 billion bond program in 2012, the largest in Texas history. But it wasn’t enough to modernize the aging schools, and in 2015 an external audit identified a $211 million budget shortfall.
The district spends an average of $11,600 per student, which is ranked 47th out of the 82 school districts in the Houston metro area.
Chicago Public Schools, which has an current budget gap of $215 million, is seeking funds from the slush fund surpluses that the city has, largely through property tax revenues and TIFs which arguably have siphoned off educational funds and instead earmarked the money for tax incentives for private developers to create projects in designated economic improvement zones. There you go: Chicago helping businesses at the expense of students and teachers, but MDN criticizes the city of Chicago for it.
Why can’t the republican stronghold of Houston figure out its budget issues? The area doesn’t even have snowstorms to contend with.
..as usual, you got the story wrong…if you had read it. It wasn’t a critique of Chicago, it was merely a way to illustrate the vast wealth that Apple has accumulated.
You’re weird.
PS: “But since Botty has nothing to do but to attack anything he…” uh, I haven’t even commented on this story, all I did was send MDN an Apple-related news item link.
PPS: “Why can’t the republican stronghold of Houston figure out its budget issues?”
uh, wrong again, Benghazi Breath. Harris (Houston, Tx) County voted for The Clot.
Vote by county – Harris County, 2016 Presidential Race
Trump Clinton
545,955 707,914
https://www.nytimes.com/elections/results/texas
Big deal. Chicago has daily shootings in the projects, does Apple have that? Will they have it on their new campus?
I didn’t think so.
And yet with those resources Apple can’t put a single person in charge of every one of their markets to keep in contact with & ensure those markets are indeed happy ones for their intended users – be they consumers, professionals or business. Instead, allowing certain product lines to languish and correction time for mistakes to cause such anguish and switching to other platforms. Creating unnecessary loss of revenue due to apathy or lack of attention.
Also remember the old adage “If it ain’t broke, don’t “fix” it.” I’m looking at you Sir Jony. Get your mind out of design school and into the minds of your customer’s and their true needs and desires.
So who has the value-added formula for the Chiraq quantifier in ANOTHER Dimm led HELL HOLE!!!
Dallas would be a much better deal.
Less BANG!! for the buck….
What purpose does this comparison serve? What is anybody supposed to do with this information. All it tells us is that Apple is a huge company – which we knew.
GDP does not in any way equal market cap. If anything it’s closer to sales than market cap. And Apple does not (yet) gross $581B a year.