Build a regional business pulse

A board, a client or a member meeting wants a short read on how the local economy is doing, this month.

Who this is for

Written for Business advisors, chambers, local lenders, regional analysts. You bring the commercial question; the published record behind it comes back with the answer, and you can see where each figure came from.

What to bring

Have these to hand before you paste the prompt. Anything you leave out should be asked for rather than guessed at.

The state, metro or county
The audience, so the emphasis matches what they care about

Try this prompt

Paste this where you connected HARBOR Port and replace the bracketed parts. It asks for sources and periods on purpose: that is what makes the answer checkable.

Create a short economic pulse for [state or county] from the latest income and output, labour, inflation and population signals. Label each figure with its period and release cadence, name anything that is stale or unpublished, and do not turn five indicators into a recession forecast.

Then ask a narrower question. These are the ones people ask next.

Which of these indicators is most out of date, and how much does that matter.

Compare this region with the national figures over the same periods.

What the answer looks like

The shape below is the point of the workflow. If a response arrives without the periods and the source behind each number, ask for them before you use it.

Four to six indicators, each with its own period and cadence
One paragraph of interpretation, clearly marked as interpretation
What is stale, what is unpublished, and what would change the read

Limits to keep in view

Census, BEA and BLS series are published on different calendars and for different periods. Every figure carries the period and geography that were actually returned, not the one that was asked for.

Not answered by this data:

Your revenue, customers, bookings, pipeline or churn
Inventory, capacity, staffing rosters or payroll
Your actual utility bills, fuel spend or supplier quotes
Business credit, insurance premiums, or lending decisions
Permit, licence or certification status
A local forecast, a hazard estimate, or a legal opinion

Where the numbers come from

The answer is built from the published sources below. Each one keeps its own geography, period and definitions, and the answer states which was used.

BEA regional accounts
BLS employment, unemployment and inflation
Census population estimates

The exact names, and where to read the detail

bea

bea_county_gdp
bea_regional_gdp_by_state
bea_personal_income_series

bls

bls_cpi_lookup
bls_employment_by_industry
bls_state_unemployment_rate

census

census_population_by_state
census_population_estimate_by_state

Scoped to what your plan reaches, and to the sources each workflow names. Reviewing the catalogue first is the cheap way to decide whether this covers your question: source catalogue.