Financial executive Ben Walter spoke to 11Alive Anchor Cheryl Preheim on Wednesday.
ATLANTA — Atlanta has a “great growth story,” the CEO of Chase Business Banking said Wednesday, and, “I don’t see that slowing down anytime soon.”
The financial executive, Ben Walter, spoke to 11Alive Anchor Cheryl Preheim on the sidelines of an event with JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon.
He said he’s seeing the economic tides turning toward increased optimism generally after uncertainty this year with tariffs and taxes, and that having a disproportionate positive impact in business-friendly Georgia.
“People have enough confidence to start to invest, people are coming off the sidelines a bit,” Walter said. “There’s no question that people have finally gotten to the point where they see demand holding up, they see opportunity and they are willing to invest more than they were, certainly, three or four months ago.”
In Georgia, he praised the business climate and “sensible rules of the road” in the regulatory environment. Gov. Brian Kemp has long touted Georgia as the best state for business, anchoring much of his legacy to the state’s business development.
Walter said Atlanta has a “great, strong workforce” to go with that business climate, making things particularly fruitful here.
“When you have that combination of really good policy, friendly business climate, and strong workforce, that’s where companies wanna go, that’s where we wanna be,” he said. “We established a technology center in Atlanta. Why? Because there was talent here.”
He said Atlanta’s challenges are not unfamiliar to anyone familiar with development in the city — transportation and housing.
“Housing is a market and we have a supply problem, and we need to build more houses. So if you want people to keep moving to Atlanta, you’re gonna have to keep building those houses because people want somewhere to live,” he said. “…I would say urge your civic and business leaders to deal with the challenges that will come from your success. If you do that, things will keep right on going.”
You can watch the full conversation between Cheryl and Walter in the video player above this story.
