[SteelTown]

Hamilton's economy hit rock bottom during the late 80's and early 90's, the last recession. Thousands of jobs were eliminated from the manufacturing sector especially the steel sector. That recession did more damage than this current recession. So because Hamilton hit rock bottom is had nowhere to go but up.

Here's an example, Stelco once had well over 10,000 employees but currently there's probably only 1,500 employees at Stelco (US Steel Canada). So if Stelco were to completely to shut down it wouldn't really have a big dramatic effect to Hamilton's economy. We've been kind of lucky to have jobs eliminated over the years than have it hit all at once.

Health care and research is really the main drive in Hamilton's economy sort of like what's happening at Pittsburgh.

The city is currently trying to rezone the land around Hamilton's Airport for businesses (it's mostly all zoned for farming). Once that happens it'll open up a massive piece of greenfield for companies to build on. There's a group of people trying to stop this because they are afraid it’ll expand the urban boundary and lead to sprawl. They are unlikely to stop this from happening but likely to stall it.

Now if we get an NHL team that would to wonders to Hamilton's downtown core. It'll encourage more hotels, retail, stronger public transit for the region, and more white collar jobs, which will create a demand for more residential units in the core.