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Units: Applied Research | MIDAS | Public Finance Initiative

What We Do:

• Maintain a regional Workforce Information System (WIS). Funding for this project is provided by City of St. Louis Agency on Training and Employment (SLATE).
• Conduct a bi-annual regional Job Vacancy Survey of 2,500 local companies.
• Create a census archive of selected demographic and household characteristics.
• Assemble data and information relevant to regional economic development issues.
• Provide Census 2000 analyses.
• Conduct a Finance and Insurance Sector Labor Demand Analysis

Projects:

• Workforce Information System: Funded by SLATE, the Workforce Information System(WIS) is an ongoing project currently in its sixth year. Twice a year, MIDAS surveys close to 2,500 local businesses throughout the two-state, twelve-county metropolitan region and provides current estimates and projections on occupation and skills demand. Complementing this information is data on regional and county economies, demographics, labor force composition and profiles of the education, training and employment communities. In 2004-05, PPRC also performed sector studies in Financial Services and in Tourism, Hospitality and Recreation, as well as one follow-up study.
  
• Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) Surveys: In 2005, the U.S. Department of Defense began the largest, joint-serviceoriented round of Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) ever attempted. Over 800 active National Guard and Reserve installations around the nation were affected. Installations in the Kansas City and St. Louis Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSA) were included in the BRAC recommendations. In responding to these closures and to help mitigate their effects on Missouri’s workforce, the Missouri Division of Workforce Development and the Missouri Economic Research and Information Center (MERIC) sought to gather current information from employers about available job vacancies in these MSAs. In May 2006, PPRC's MIDAS unit conducted their first Job Vacancy Survey for both the St. Louis MSA and the Kansas City MSA.
  
• Workforce Investment Boards: MIDAS facilitated a Skills Gap Planning process for the four Missouri Workforce Investment Boards (WIB). Underwritten by funds for the State Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, this planning process was designed to identify key occupations in key sectors of the local economy and to determine how the resources of the WIBs, community colleges and economic development agencies could address any “skill gaps”. This process identified the Health Care sector and nurses and physical therapists as the targeted occupations.
  
• United Way Philanthropy Study: MIDAS conducted a literature review of research on philanthropic macro trends, population segments and methods of communication used in fundraising. The report also looked at giving in generational contexts, minority fundraising, volunteerism and organizational “branding” as a means of marketing and fundraising.
  
• Migration Analysis Study: MIDAS has been engaged a study to examine population movements to, from, and within the St. Louis region. The study looks at reasons people choose to remain in a neighborhood, and specifically on economic and housing-related factors.