Playing a Vital Role in the Southern California Economy

USC is responsible for $4 billion annually in economic activity in Los Angeles County alone, according to an economic impact analysis released on December 6, 2006.

The university is also the City of Los Angeles’ largest private employer, providing jobs for 26,446 people during the 2005-06 fiscal year. In addition, USC’s economic activity produced another 16,318 non-USC jobs in the regional economy.

During that same period, USC injected $1.86 billion into the economy, with an estimated additional indirect and induced output from the university of more than $2.14 billion in Los Angeles County.

The study, titled “Economic Impact Analysis of the University of Southern California Annual Operations: Fiscal Year 2005-06,” was produced by the international consulting firm Economics Research Associates. It includes the impacts of USC’s academic spending; it does not include the direct spending or impacts of USC-affiliated hospitals.

Among the report’s other findings for the fiscal year studied:

• Every $1 million spent by USC in the region supports 10.6 full-time equivalent jobs;
• For every dollar spent by USC in Los Angeles County, an additional 39 cents of economic output was created in the regional economy;
• USC’s 32,000 students annually spend $406 million in the economy;
• USC visitors bring more than $12.3 million in direct expenditures to the local economy; and
• USC capital construction expenditures last year totaled more than
  $207 million.

“The university has always been an incredible asset to the city and the region as a whole,” said USC President Steven B. Sample. “Since its founding more than 125 years ago, USC has been there to meet the needs of this ever-growing and ever more important part of the world. Today, Los Angeles has a role of global importance — it is the de facto capital city of the Pacific Rim. USC is better positioned than ever to significantly impact not only the region’s economy but the world’s as well.”

Sample added that not only is USC the largest private employer in the city of Los Angeles, but it is L.A.'s biggest export industry in the private sector, attracting more dollars from outside Los Angeles' economy than any private corporation in the city.

“We knew USC was a huge economic engine for Southern California, and these study results reveal just how big the piece of economic pie the institution has in the region,” added study author David Bergman of Economics Research Associates. “The fact that USC accounts for one 100th of a percent of the state’s GDP is very significant. California is the fifth largest economy in the world.”

Click here for a PDF (5MB) of the full report.