Economy and development

Despite declining economies in other parts of the United States, from 2005 through 2009 Richardson had substantial increases in its economy. The city's total assessed property value went up from $8.3 billion in 2005 to $9.5 billion 2008. Sales tax collection went up from $21 million in 2005 to an estimated $24.7 million in 2008. The city has also achieved a considerable amount of corporate recruitment and retention. Including the new Blue Cross Blue Shield development, the largest Dallas–Fort Worth Metroplex office campus development since 1987 is a 15-story, 1,000,000-square-foot (93,000 m2) regional headquarters, where 3,100 employees work. Other major corporate expansions or relocations include Bank of America Financial Services, MetroPCS (corporate HQ), Yahoo, Fujitsu Transaction Solutions, and Halff Associates.

The city has experienced a surge of mixed-use development, suburban infill and transit-oriented development, predominantly on the city's eastern side. The Venue is a 4-acre (16,000 m2) mixed-use development adjacent to Galatyn Park, a DART rail station. Eastside, a mixed-use, infill development, is at the midpoint of two rail stations, Araphaho Center and Galatyn Park. Eastside is located on the southeast corner of Campbell Road and US 75. It features 450 apartments by Post Properties, 90,000 square feet (8,400 m2) of retail and restaurant space and 35,000 square feet (3,300 m2) of office space in addition to an 11-story class A office building that was pre-existing on the development site. Eastside Phase II will include 12 acres (49,000 m2) of office and mixed-use development. Brick Row, a $200 million mixed-use development, is located on the northwest corner of Spring Valley Road and Greenville Avenue, less than half of a mile east of US 75. Brick Row borders the Spring Valley Station and will have at completion 500 upscale apartments, 150 townhomes and up to 300 condominiums surrounding the historic natural McKamie Springs. The Shire is a mixed-use center of 6.5 acres (26,000 m2). Phase II is an additional 10 acres (40,000 m2). The former Richardson Square Mall has been redeveloped into an outdoor retail center. Other retail centers have been re-developed or remodeled including Buckingham Plaza, Buckingham Square, Dal-Rich Village, Richardson Village, II Creeks, Richardson Heights and Richardson Village.

This city has won many economic awards, including DBJ’s 2006 “Best Real Estate Deal of the Year”, International Economic Development Council's 2006 "Technology-Based Economic Development Award", and Texas Economic Development Council's 2007 "Texas Economic Excellence Award".

Since 2008, both Standard & Poor's and Moody's have upgraded Richardson's credit rating to “AAA” from the previous rating of “AA+”. At the time, Richardson was one of only four cities in the state of Texas and one of 88 cities in the nation with an “AAA” rating from Standard & Poor’s. Richardson is the metropolitan statistical area's second largest employment center with daytime population increasing to more than 140,000. The economy remains rooted in the telecommunications industry. However, Richardson's property tax base is deep and extends beyond its Telecom Corridor area with other sectors including health care, technology, and finance. The City’s per capita sales are 200 percent of the national average as well as the second highest sales tax per capita in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex. The tax base is very diverse with the 10 leading taxpayers accounting for 10 percent of total assessed value.

Late-2000s recession

In the overall economic downturn or the late-2000s recession, Richardson has not been affected as adversely as other cities in the nation, Texas or even the North Texas region. In June 2010 both Moody's and Standard and Poor's bond rating agencies reaffirmed the city’s “AAA” rating, the highest assigned by either agency. Of the cities that maintain bond ratings, Richardson is in the top 3.1% in the state and the top 6.8% nationally. Always a technology-centric city, Richardson has fully recovered from the tech downturn of 2001-2003. The city has diversified its business base with financial service firms and has adopted a live-work-play approach to future mixed-use and transit-oriented developments. As of early 2011 local unemployment was still high by historical standards at just over 7%, but lower than the state and federal unemployment levels. This is down from the unemployment rate of 8.4% in August 2010 according to figures collected by the NCTCOG

Corporate headquarters

MetroPCS, Fossil, Lennox International, Vent-A-Hood, Wingstop Restaurants VCE have their corporate headquarters in Richardson.

Major employers

According to the Richardson Economic Development Partnership's listing on Major Employers (last updated December 2011), the top employers in the city are:

# Employer # of Employees 1 AT&T Inc. 4,300 2 Bank of America 3,300 3 Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Texas 3,100 4 The University of Texas at Dallas 2,830 5 Ericsson 2,500 6 Richardson Independent School District 2,500 7 Verizon Business 2,250 8 Fujitsu 1,500 9 Rockwell Collins 1,200 10 Cisco Systems 1,200 11 United Healthcare 1,100 12 Fossil, Inc. 1,100 13 Lennox International 1,000