New York City’s Central Business District, which encompasses Midtown and Downtown Manhattan, has been an influential economic and financial capital since the 19th century, mainly thanks to the presence of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) and other important financial institutions.

Today, it is the largest central business district in the United States, with a total area of 2.2 square miles. 

Key Facts & Figures about NYC Central Business District

•         The central business district consists of three sub-districts: Midtown, Midtown South, and Downtown, which are further divided into 18 sub-markets.
•         There are approximately 190,000 small businesses, which employ more than 900,000 people. 
•         This area is home to 40 Fortune 500 corporations, the highest concentration in the country.
•         The New York central business district was recently listed as the second best startup ecosystem in the nation and worldwide.
•         The central business district has more than 617,000 residents and nearly 900,000 people commute into the area every day.
•         Local companies attracted nearly $20bn in venture capital funding in 2023.
•         In 2023, NYC attracted more than 62 million visitors per year, with business travelers accounting for 20% of the total.

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All over the United States, central business districts serve as a magnet for economic growth and employment. In this article, we offer an updated overview of the top 10 largest CBDs in the country, accounting for the changes that CBDs have experienced post-2020.

1. New York City

New York City’s CBD is the largest in the country and covers a large area in Midtown and downtown Manhattan.

The city’s CBD contains nearly 420 million square feet of office real estate, with the biggest clusters being in Grand Central, Penn Station, Sixth Avenue, Rockefeller Center, Financial East, and World Trade Center.

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Los Angeles County is home to the nation’s second largest metropolitan area and to one of the world’s most powerful economies. The county is made up of 88 cities and has approximately 300,000 employers, which provide jobs to a workforce of nearly 5 million people.

Major Industries and Employers in Los Angeles County

Key industries include entertainment and media due to the presence of highly successful companies like Walt Disney, Warner Bros, and Paramount Pictures. Trade is also a strong economic driver due to the location of the Port of Los Angeles, situated in the southern part of the county, which is one of the state’s largest employers with over 800,000 employees.

Education and healthcare have been paramount to the local economy since the mid 20th century, as the county is home to prestigious institutions that include the University of California, California Institute of Technology, and Loyola Law School, as well as to healthcare corporations like CareMore, Health Net, and Molina Healthcare.

Other sectors worth mentioning include pharma, fashion, hospitality, tourism, financial services, and publishing. Tech-related activities have grown fast and now employ nearly 400,000 people, but the creative industry is by far the sector with the highest growth rates, supporting more than 740,000 jobs.

Key employers include CBRE, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Snapchat, and Universal Pictures (Los Angeles), Walt Disney (Burbank), Riot Games and Hulu (Santa Monica), Toyota and Honda (Torrance), Isuzu Motors (Cerritos), and Avery Dennison (Glendale).   Read the rest of this entry »

Los Angeles CBD is a thriving commercial hub comprised of 15 districts: Skid Row, Civic Center, Little Tokyo, Old Bank, South Park, Historic Core, Gallery Row, Fashion District, Arts District, Warehouse District, Jewelry District, Industrial District, and Toy District. Bunker Hill and the Financial District are also part of downtown Los Angeles and are considered the city’s business core area.

Los Angeles’ CBD was first defined as a business district in 1920, and was expanded and redeveloped during the 1950s and 1960s, when several high-rise office buildings were added to the city’s urban landscape. Downtown LA is easily accessible by road and mass transit, as the area lies at the intersection between the I-10, I-5 and I-110 roads, and is served by 4 Metro lines. Union Station is located on the northern edge of the CBD, and Los Angeles International airport is only 19 miles away from the downtown area.

Unlike other US business districts, downtown LA has a large (and growing) permanent population. In 2016, more than 50,000 people lived within a 2-mile radius of the CBD, and particularly in the eastern fringe, where many office buildings have been converted into residential units. Read the rest of this entry »

Entrepreneurs and new businesses in the south are encouraged to relocate to Georgia and North Carolina, as Greensboro, Augusta and Columbus feature in a recent article from USA Today which highlights the best cities for new start ups. The article discusses the best and worst cities for new business start ups and you may be surprised to learn that New York and Los Angeles may not be the best locations for budding entrepreneurs. Dollars may be floating around some of the multinationals and Silicon Valley corporations but many new businesses struggle to make a name and income in these locations, while quality of lifestyle is also a major consideration.

Reasons Augusta, Columbus and Greensboro are the Best Cities to Start a Business in the South USA

You’ll find multinationals, major hospitals, world leading research institutes, universities and hosts of SMEs situated in Augusta, Columbus and Greensboro, with plentiful opportunities for any new business and less expensive office/retail locations than cities like New York or LA. Local chambers of commerce provide generous support and networks for added support once your business is operational.

Greensboro

Starting up in Greensboro allows you to pull in customers from the surrounding areas of Kernersville, Summerfield and High Point, while the thriving city population totals almost 300,000. The local Chamber of Commerce runs free seminars from the Center at Guilford Technical College, with added courses, workshops and seminars at a variety of locations, including the Nussbaum Center and the Con. Ed. Center. You can source advice and information from the Chamber, and the structured workshops give any budding entrepreneur all the advice and information required to start up a successful company.

Augusta

Augusta has one of the largest medical conurbations in the States and is also home to the Dept. of Energy nuclear facility based on the Savannah River. A number of multinationals are located in the neighborhood, while near by Fort Gordon is home to the Army Signals. Census figures show the 2012 Augusta population to be around 200,000. The Downtown Development Authority 2008 guide to starting up a new business is available for free download, while StartUp Augusta is a LinkedIn mentoring service offering support to local business startups via its online community. Read the rest of this entry »

Centered on the north-central region of the country, the Midwest United States includes 12 states including Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota and Wisconsin. Although major urban centers such as Chicago are known around the world as key economic drivers, the Midwest is also home to several smaller cities that provide promising conditions for new businesses. WalletHub’s 2015 ranking of the best cities to start of a business in the United States included six Midwestern cities in the top 20. The ranking used a number of metrics, from the five-year survival rate of businesses to the affordability of office space.

Springfield, Missouri
Springfield, Missouri ranked as the best Midwestern city to start of business in the United States, according to the 2015 study. The city also placed first nationally in terms of access to resources, including financing and affordable office space. Known as the Queen City of the Ozarks and the Birthplace of Route 66, Springfield is home to the Missouri State University and Drury University. The third largest city in Missouri is the economic hub of an area that spans 27 counties in Missouri and neighboring Arkansas and is home to some 1 million people. The economy is based on health care, manufacturing, retail, education and tourism. The city has also been recognized for its high quality of life, and in 2008 it was among the best communities for young people by the America’s Promise Alliance and relocating families by Worldwide ERC.

Sioux Falls, South Dakota
The same ranking found that Sioux Falls was the sixth best city to start a business in the US. With a growing population, the city also ranked second in terms of the best business environment in the United States. It was also named as the next big boom town by The Atlantic in 2013. The largest city in South Dakota, Sioux Falls is a diverse economic center focused on financial services, health care and retail. Sitting on the crossroads of interstates 90 and 29, the city is within a day’s drive from many major cities in the Midwest. The lack of a state corporate tax has helped attract a number of financial companies to Sioux Falls, including Wells Fargo and Citigroup. Read the rest of this entry »

Overview of Business in Denver

Over the past few years, Colorado’s capital city has been making great progress in diversifying its economic base, attracting an increasing number of new businesses in a variety of industries. As a result, Denver is currently considered one of the key commercial real estate markets to watch. A survey published by the Denver Business Journal in 2014 revealed that more than half of the interviewees gave a good rating to the city’s office and retail property market, classifying them as definite ‘buys’. The same report cites industrial diversity as one of the most attractive features of the local economy and as the principal driver of business in the city. These factors have positioned Denver as one of the best US cities for small-sized businesses, as the city ranks as high as New York and Miami in terms of business per capita, industry variety, and net growth.

Major Industries and Key Economic Drivers in Denver

Since the 1990s, new technologies have been driving growth in the local economy. High-tech companies are mainly clustered around the business parks located to the northwest of the city centre, such as the Westmoor Technology Park, Centennial Valley, and the Interlocken Advanced Technology Park. According to Forbes, over the past five years industry sectors like renewable energy, telecommunications, and aerospace have grown in importance and now constitute key economic drivers for the local economy. Read the rest of this entry »

Overview of Business in Manhattan

For decades, Manhattan has been a global business hub of undisputed prestige. This New York borough is home to some of the world’s most successful businesses and to the largest stock exchange in the world. Manhattan has repeatedly topped the global lists of most powerful cities, staying ahead of other leading business hubs like London, Dubai, Hong Kong, or Shanghai. Due to its excellent infrastructure, world-class business environment, and valuable human capital, Manhattan is the world’s most desirable business location . The borough’s thriving business scene is a catalyst for economic growth, and this is reflected in the local employment levels. According to the NYCEDC, more than 310,000 jobs are based in this borough, tens of thousands of which have been created in the private sector since 2005.

Major Industries

The banking and financial sector is the key economic driver for the local economy. More than 300,000 people are employed in this industry, which according to the Federal Reserve generates more than 35 per cent of the city’s income. The service sector is another key industry in Manhattan, as it employs over 1 million people in areas like tourism (over 240,000 jobs), professional and business services (287,000 jobs), or healthcare and social assistance (208,000 jobs).

The number of technology, advertising, media, and information companies (TAMIs) has skyrocketed since 2009. Back then, TAMIs barely occupied 100,000 square feet of space in Manhattan, but at the end of 2014 that figure had increased to more than 1.6 million. A report published by the Downtown alliance estimates that this sector is comprised of over 800 firms that generate a combined annual output of $125 billion and that employ nearly 29,000 people. Likewise, Manhattan has recently been attracting a steady number of creative firms. According to an article published at the Wall Street Journal, the number of employees working in creative ventures in this part of Manhattan has increased by 71 per cent over the past five years. Read the rest of this entry »

The city of San Francisco is one of the top business hubs in the Americas. The local business community is among the most vibrant and successful at global level, partly due to the huge pool of talent available in the city and its surrounding areas. A large number of Fortune 500 companies are based in the area, and business opportunities exist for enterprises operating in a wide range of sectors, from aerospace to health care and including electronics, consumer goods, retail, and telecommunications.

The undeniable appeal of San Francisco as a business location has attracted hundreds of prospective entrepreneurs to the area. If you are considering setting up a business in San Francisco, take a look at our detailed guide to commercial property in this thriving Californian city.

Key Trends in the San Francisco CRE Market
For the past two years, the local commercial property market in San Francisco has shown a variety of healthy indicators.
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Overview of Business in Los Angeles

A variety of industries help to make Los Angeles the successful economic center that it is. The city attracts businesses in the tourism, TV/film, hospitality and technology industries. These are not the only industries that thrive in the city, however. Traditional industries like law, finance and medicine also create jobs for residents in the city. Young professionals are attracted to the opportunities presented by the technology, medical and information industries.

International trade is also a major driver of the economy of Los Angeles, with its twin ports handling more than forty percent of both inbound and outbound containers for the whole country. More than one hundred and sixty thousand workers support the international trade sector in L.A. county.

Major Industries & Key Economic Drivers in Los Angeles

Technology continues to be a driving force behind the economy in L.A. and a number of major tech companies have their corporate offices in city and its surrounding areas. The information industry continues to provide numerous job opportunities for young graduates, in particular, the film and video gaming industries. The biotech industry is also combining with the information industry to create new applications that are beneficial for the health of society. Read the rest of this entry »