Denver, Colorado

The City and County of Denver is the largest city and capital of the state of Colorado, United States of America. It is the largest city along the Front Range and forms the heart of the Denver-Aurora metropolitan area.

Economy

Denver's economy is to some degree based on its geographic position and its connection to some of the major transportation systems of the country. Since Denver is the largest city within 600 miles, it has become a natural location for storage and distribution of goods and services to the Mountain States. Denver is also approximately halfway between the large cities of the Midwest like Chicago and St. Louis and the cities of the West Coast, another benefit for distribution.

Related Topics:
Mountain States - Midwest - Chicago - St. Louis - West Coast

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This position also allows Denver to have a considerable amount of federal jobs with many federal agencies based or having offices in the Denver area. This includes the Denver Federal Center, in nearby Lakewood, Colorado. In fact, the Denver Metropolitan Area has more federal workers than any other city except for the Washington D.C. metropolitan area. Along with the plethora of federal agencies comes many companies based on US defense and space projects. Lockheed-Martin, and Ball Aerospace are examples. Of course, being the capital of the state of Colorado also gives many state jobs to Denver.

Related Topics:
Lakewood, Colorado - Denver Metropolitan Area - Washington D.C. - Lockheed-Martin - Ball Aerospace - Capital - Colorado

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Denver's position near the mineral-rich Rocky Mountains, encouraged mining and energy companies to spring up in the area. In the early days of the city, gold and silver booms and busts played a large role in the economic success of the city. In the 1970s and early '80s, the energy crisis in America created an energy boom in Denver captured in the soap opera Dynasty. During this time, Denver was built up considerably, with many new downtown skyscrapers built during this time. Eventually the oil prices dropped from $34 a barrel in 1981 to $9 a barrel in 1986, and the Denver economy dropped with it, leaving almost 15,000 oil industry workers in the area unemployed (including mayor John Hickenlooper, a former geologist), and the highest office vacancy rate in the nation (30%). Energy and mining are still important in Denver's economy today, with companies such as Newmont Mining, Patina Oil and Gas, and Western Gas Resources.

Related Topics:
Rocky Mountains - 1970s - '80s - Dynasty - Skyscrapers - John Hickenlooper - Newmont Mining - Patina Oil and Gas - Western Gas Resources

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Denver's west-central geographic location in the Mountain Time Zone (UTC -7) also benefits the telecommunications industry by allowing communication with both North American coasts, South America, Europe, and Asia in the same business day. Denver's location on the 105th meridian at over 1 mile in elevation also enables it to be the largest city in the U.S. to offer a 'one-bounce' real-time satellite uplink to 6 continents in the same business day. Qwest Communications, EchoStar, Starz-Encore, and Comcast are just a few of the telecommunications companies with operations in the Denver area. These and other high-tech companies had a boom in Denver in the mid to late 1990s, but the technology bust in the new millennium caused Denver to lose many of those technology jobs. Recently the Denver area has started making a comeback, with an unemployment level of 5.3%, considerably lower than the 6.4% unemployment from just a year before. Denver government and industry leaders are attempting to diversify the Denver economy so that it is less susceptible to boom and bust cycles.

Related Topics:
Qwest Communications - EchoStar - Starz-Encore - Comcast - 1990s

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Other companies with major operations in the Denver area include:

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• Frontier Airlines
• Coors
• J.D. Edwards, now part of Oracle Corporation
• Regal Entertainment Group
• Samsonite
• StorageTek
• Sun Microsystems
• Sports Authority
• Quizno's
• First Data
• United Airlines