Puerto Rico's Economic Boom: Jobs, Homeownership, and Pharma #shorts

Added: 2026-05-25

[00:00:00]But let's start with the pro- the the prosperity and what and what was what came out of the economic well incentive.

[00:00:07]For example, I can tell you that we had uh between '85, I'm talking about the years that I was in government, >> Yeah. we had a com- a cumulative cumulative economic growth of 20.8%.

[00:00:22]>> From '85 to >> From '85 to '91.

[00:00:25]240,000 jobs were created [music] in those 8 years.

[00:00:31]>> Jeez.

[00:00:31]Total employment, total 999,000 [music] in fiscal year 1993.

[00:00:39]So a million people were employed.

[00:00:41]>> the highest level up to that time.

[00:00:45]The per capita income in Puerto Rico was higher and more evenly distributed than in any country in Latin America. Yeah, I I heard that. I heard that at that time period homeownership was at 68% in Puerto Rico.

[00:00:58]It highest the highest home owner rate than anywhere in the United States. No, anywhere in the world. I think it was anywhere in the world. Well, the For example, you take the 936 phones that we talked before about about it in the banks from '85 to '92 amounted to 1 billion uh 287 million. And that equaled low >> was important. And that equaled [music] low interest loans for Right. For buying homes.

[00:01:29]>> development in >> For buying whatever the Puerto Ricans needed. As I said, you know, the economic the eco- economic grew in Puerto Rico faster than that of the United States.

[00:01:40]Uh when the United States was in recession in the '90s, Puerto Rico was not. Puerto Rico became the capital of the pharmaceutical industry in the world. We're still producing more than twice what the highest uh participation in pharmaceutical product is in any states in the United States.