Many dispute whether Decatur is doing well economically or not. Decatur is smack in the middle of 1 million people within 1 hour drive. We have a great transportation grid, great skilled workers and cheap real estate that can be used to market Decatur for growth. However, it only confuses the debate when people distort the statistics. For example, the Decatur labor force does not reflect great gains (like other cities in IL ). Here is data from the US Dept of Labor:
These tables of data are not particularly user friendly, but do tell the story. A careful analysis shows that there is little real job growth over the last ten years. In recent years there is some job growth, and it would appear that most of that is in the education and health fields.
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