For southwestern Pennsylvania sports fans, times are good. The Pittsburgh Pirates — coined “the Comeback Kids of Baseball” — have the second-best winning percentage in all of major league baseball. And tomorrow night, the puck drops at the CONSOL Energy Center, with eight wins separating the hometown Penguins and their fourth Stanley Cup.
While Pittsburgh’s sports teams are riding high – gaining national attention – so is our regional economy. Under the headline “Why Pittsburgh is becoming a boomtown,” MSN.com reports today that “Proximity to new oil and natural gas sites is drawing interest from abroad and fueling the city’s economic and population growth.”
And yesterday, CNN reports that Pittsburgh is becoming an international business hub, thanks principally to safe, job-creating American natural gas production. This from CNN’s story under the headline “Pittsburgh becomes expat hot spot”:
Thanks to the shifting nature of the global economy, some once down-and-out cities are seeing an influx of foreign executives and other personnel from international organizations. Pittsburgh, a former steel powerhouse, has emerged as a hot bed for operations related to the oil and gas boom in western Pennsylvania and eastern Ohio.
More jobs and manufacturing, more clean-burning natural gas, a stronger, healthier environment — and winning baseball and hockey streaks, to boot. Welcome to Pittsburgh.
