The U.S. biosciences industry directly employs 1.74 million people and indirectly supports $2.0 trillion in economic output and roughly 8 million jobs nationwide, according to "Investment, Innovation and Job Creation in a Growing U.S. Biosciences Industry," a new report by TEConomy Partners on behalf of the trade association BIO.

The Senate Committee on Appropriations this morning advanced a funding bill that includes $25 million for Regional Innovation Strategies — $4 million more than the current funding round.

Although SBIR/STTR matching programs have existed at the state and regional levels for years, Montgomery County, Maryland, recently launched the country’s first county-based match program. The county council overwhelmingly approved the program, which will target Montgomery County-based small businesses receiving Phase I or Phase II SBIR/STTR grants through the National Institutes of Health (NIH), whose main offices are also within the county.

Over the past few weeks, Delaware, New Jersey, and Tennessee have proposed, announced or expanded investment tax credit programs to spur job creation and innovation. In Delaware, Gov.

Shifts in the American economy have resulted in a myriad of challenges including workers without the necessary skills for today’s jobs, lack of wage increases for low- and middle-income worker and a shrinking labor force participation rate.

Could climate change negatively impact the defense installations important to companies and communities in your state? Chances are good that it already does. A new Department of Defense report to Congress reveals all but six of 79 mission assurance priority installations within DOD are experiencing negative climate change effects such as recurrent flooding, drought, desertification, wildfires, or thawing permafrost.

As the number of weather-related news stories increase, more Americans are recognizing the world’s climate is changing (see here and here, for instance).

Late last year, the Walton Family Charitable Support Foundation announced a $23.7 million investment to strengthen technology-based economic development efforts at the University of Arkansas.

Recent research revealed that exposure to innovation (e.g., mentorship program and immersive K-12 STEM education experience) during childhood and young adulthood has a greater effect on the decision to pursue careers in innovation than financial incentives. Researchers Alexander M. Bell, Raj Chetty, and their co-authors developed a model to analyze the impact of several factors on inventor career choices.

Educating the next generation of workers, ensuring they will have the skills necessary for the jobs of the future and paying attention to the actions that will affect the climate are all on the agendas of the latest round of governors giving their state of the state and budget addresses. A focus on skills can be seen in addresses from governors in California, Maine, Michigan, Oklahoma and Pennsylvania. States are also continuing with initiatives to forward attention on climate change, as reflected in Maine’s climate agenda and Michigan joining other states in the Climate Alliance.

Companies employing more than 5,000 people represent nearly two-thirds (63.9 percent) of all business R&D in the United States, according to an analysis of NSF’s Business Research, Development, and Innovation Survey (BRDIS). With the recent release of more detailed numbers and to expand on a Useful Stats report from earlier this year, this analysis focuses on business R&D by company size.

JPMorgan Chase announced the creation of AdvancingCities, a new $500 million, five-year initiative to drive inclusive growth and create greater economic opportunity in cities across the world. The firm will invest in cities where conditions exist to help those who have not benefited from economic growth. This includes demonstrated collaboration across the public and private sectors on solutions that create opportunity for people at risk of being left out of economic growth. Successful applications will be eligible for a three-year grant of up to $3 million.

The “AI Next” campaign, announced by DARPA last week, is geared toward moving AI defense applications into a “third wave” of advancement, capable of complex problem-solving. DARPA will be investing $2 billion into AI through a variety of programs, and a core element of this initiative will be “AI Exploration” projects designed to move from proposal to start in three months, and from start to feasibility assessments within 18 months.

The National Science Foundation (NSF) announced the 2026 Idea Machine – a prize competition to help set the U.S. agenda for future fundamental research in science and engineering. Participants can earn cash prizes and receive public recognition by submitting the pressing research questions that need to be answered in the coming decade.

The carbon tech industry in Wyoming could support an average of 2,600 jobs annually over the next 17 years, according to a new report by the American Jobs Project — a U.C. Berkeley-based nonpartisan think tank. Developed in partnership with the University of Wyoming, American Jobs Project researchers contend that the projected job growth could occur if the state government and private industry invested in growing this industry cluster.

Investments in rural broadband deployment can create significant returns on investments for state economies. A recent study from Purdue University's Center for Regional Development contends that Indiana could generate a $12 billion economic impact over 20 years with strategic broadband investments in rural areas across the state. Purdue researchers estimate that for every dollar invested in broadband by the state, there would a ROI of nearly $4 to the economy.

SSTI is publishing a series of FY 2019 budget updates to match Congress’s unusually early action. 

Although more city finance officers are optimistic about the fiscal capacity of their cities than last year, that optimism is tempered by the fact that tax revenue growth is experiencing a year-over-year slowdown, with growth in service costs and other expenditure outpacing it. That, taken together with other results of the 2018 City Fiscal Conditions survey, suggests that cities are reaching the limits of fiscal expansion, according to the National League of Cities (NLC).

The CDFI Fund awarded $165 million in financial and technical assistance awards to 264 organizations yesterday. The awards include funding to SSTI member Launch NY and to three other groups certified by the CDFI Fund as community venture capital funds, out of applications from 432 organizations around the country.

American Community Survey released its one-year estimates for 2017 on Sept. 13, with new statistics on income, poverty, educational attainment and a variety of other topics. ACS reports that many large metropolitan areas saw an increase in income and a decrease in poverty rates between 2016 and 2017.

A new platform to match promising start-ups with experienced business executives, investors and startup mentors from participating school’s alumni ranks is reporting momentum.

Too many communities continue to focus on business attraction in lieu of entrepreneurial support, according to the Kauffman Foundation leadership in their 10th annual State of Entrepreneurship Address. To increase the focus on entrepreneurs, the foundation indicated it plans to help 200 communities across the country, and 200,000 entrepreneurs in these communities over the next five years, with an emphasis on the middle of country and underrepresented populations, but it did not provide specific details on how it would provide that assistance. As part of the effort, Kauffman also released a checklist highlighting barriers and breakthroughs in entrepreneurship, as well as ways individuals can help grow more inclusive and innovative local economies. In the week leading up to the address, Kauffman also introduced four indicators at the national, state, and metropolitan levels as part of its new approach to tracking early-stage entrepreneurship.

There are numerous opportunities for policymakers and elected officials at the state and local levels to encourage clean energy, and doing so could spur economic development, according to a new report by David Hart, a senior fellow at the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF) and a professor of public policy at George Mason University.  As state and local leaders pursue these strategies, Hart focuses on five non-exclusive tracks to pursue: off

The share of H-1B applications approved by United States Citizen and Immigration Services (USCIS) in FY 2018 was well below the levels in FY 2017 and FY 2016, and new data from the first quarter of FY 2019 shows a continuing downward trend.