July 17, 2015 - Skyline Newspaper

By Skyline Newspaper July 17, 2015 8 years 331 words

Houston Throws The Gauntlet: Chicago Soon To Be Fourth Largest City

Residents of the city of Houston are feeling especially cocky this summer. Space City’s main newspaper, the Houston Chronicle boldly declared in June, “The question isn’t whether we’ll be the nation’s …

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According to statistics recently released by the U.S. Census Bureau, Chicago’s population growth slowed considerably in 2014, while the city of Houston continued a long-running surge in population growth. In 2014, most of Chicago’s biggest neighborhoods lost population overall, including a 34% decline in the south-side neighborhood of Riverdale.

Almost 40% of U.S. citizens never leave the city in which they were born; however, for Americans who do move, a new job is overwhelmingly the most popular reason. And Houston has consistently been ranked as one of the best U.S. cities for young professionals to find work in recent years. According to a Pew survey, 44% of Americans who moved said they did so because of a new job opportunity.

But for Windy City natives proud of their status as America’s third largest city, and the largest in the Midwest, there’s reason for hope. Many demographic experts are urging at least a little skepticism over Houston’s ambitious claims. University of Southern California demographer Dowell Myers said that Houston’s chances of overtaking Chicago were merely “probable,” not certain.

If Houston and Chicago both maintain the population growth rates seen so far this decade, then Houston will become the third largest American city in 2030, possibly even sooner.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, Illinois and Chicago did have a disproportionate number of Generation X members living within their borders. That’s the generation of Americans that came of age in the John Hughes film era, with its Chicago-obsessed imagery and locales.

According to the Census Bureau figures, Millennials now outnumber Baby Boomers nationwide, at 83.1 million and 75.4 million respectively. The nation is also becoming increasingly racially diverse.

Whether the Windy City retains its crown as America’s third largest city remains to be seen.

By Skyline Newspaper July 17, 2015 8 years 307 words

Chicago Places New Cloud Tax on Paid Streaming Services

The city of Chicago hasn’t been bringing in the revenue it needs to bandage up its current financial mess, but many residents and businesses in the Chicago area have begun voicing …

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The city of Chicago hasn’t been bringing in the revenue it needs to bandage up its current financial mess, but many residents and businesses in the Chicago area have begun voicing their discontent with the newest tax policy and stating that city officials have hit a new low.

Starting on September 1 of this year, the city will be starting what it calls a “cloud tax.” This tax would place a 9% fee on paid streaming services that use cloud-based platforms; services like Netflix, Hulu, and Spotify will all be required to pay an extra fee, which means that the prices of these services will certainly go up.

Business Insider and Crain’s Chicago Business report that the “city amusement tax” is actually already in place, although it currently only applies to tickets purchased for sporting events and concerts. The newer cloud tax would be considered an extension of this amusement tax.

Lawmakers also explained that the space used by cloud computing services is considered property — city property — and the businesses that offer cloud-based services are essentially “leasing” that property.

The Chicago Tribune reported that the city expects to bring in about $12 million annually just from the cloud tax alone, which will certainly help the city climb out of its black hole of debt.

But if individual businesses suffer from the tax, the extra revenue that the city brings in won’t be very helpful in terms of financial stability. Recent estimates show that about 84% of companies that switched to the cloud ended up saving money, so it’s clear that the driving force behind cloud-based services is first and foremost cost-effectiveness.

In light of the many protestation, Chicago officials are reportedly considering to place startups in a group exempt from the cloud tax — but as for the other businesses, they’ll be left to fend for themselves.