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The war in Iraq is coming to a close, and American troops will withdraw from Afghanistan by 2014. The unemployment rate for post 9-11 veterans is 13.1%. This jumps to a staggering 30% for veterans under the age of 25. There are currently more than one million unemployed vets, and 75,000 of them are homeless.
In an effort to counter this, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce launched the “Hiring our Heroes” program last year, on which the Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce is a partner. Over 1,000 job-seeking veterans and their spouses joined over 100 employers Wednesday at the Hilton Chicago for a job fair matching unemployed vets with Chicagoland companies.
As President & CEO of Walgreen Co. and a board member for a multitude of prominent Chicago business and civic organizations, Gregory Wasson is the ideal keynote speaker for this year’s Annual Meeting of Membership, which will take place at the Hyatt Regency Chicago on June 5.
Wasson joined Walgreens as an intern in 1980 and was eventually named a Walgreens vice president and executive vice president of Walgreens Health Initiatives in 2001 after 21 years with the company. He became president and chief operating officer of Walgreens in 2007 and was appointed CEO in February 2009.
Utility patent output is one of the leading indicators of innovation, reflecting several factors: the concentration of companies in innovation-focused industries such as semiconductors or pharmaceuticals; the level of public and private sector R&D funding; and partnerships between the private sector and research institutions. As a product of these economic assets contributing to entrepreneurship and high-tech employment, patent output is a good comparative measure of the relative robustness and dynamism of specific innovation ecosystems. As this month’s Index reveals, Illinois has consistently ranked among the top ten states for patent output, and targeted efforts to support innovation can help Illinois maintain its position.
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