section_path: Economy
section_name: Economy
paragraph_text: Economy
  
  The economy of Los Angeles is driven by international trade, entertainment (television, motion pictures, video games, music recording, and production), aerospace, technology, petroleum, fashion, apparel, and tourism. Other significant industries include finance, telecommunications, law, healthcare, and transportation. In the 2017 Global Financial Centres Index, Los Angeles was ranked the 19th most competitive financial center in the world and sixth most competitive in the U.S. after New York City, San Francisco, Chicago, Boston, and Washington, D.C. Although many businesses have left downtown Los Angeles following the COVID-19 pandemic, efforts are underway to re-invent the neighborhood as a cultural center with a large architectural showcase in Bunker Hill designed by Frank Gehry.
  
  Of the five major film studios, only Paramount Pictures is within Los Angeles' city limits; it is located in the so-called Thirty-Mile Zone of entertainment headquarters in Southern California.
  
  Los Angeles is the largest manufacturing center in the United States. The contiguous ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach together comprise the busiest port in the United States by some measures and the fifth busiest port in the world, vital to trade within the Pacific Rim.
  
  The Los Angeles metropolitan area has a gross metropolitan product of over $1.0 trillion (as of 2018), making it the third-largest economic metropolitan area in the world, after New York and Tokyo. Los Angeles has been classified an " alpha world city " according to a 2012 study by a group at Loughborough University.
  
  The Department of Cannabis Regulation enforces cannabis legislation after the legalization of the sale and distribution of cannabis in 2016. As of October 2019, more than 300 existing cannabis businesses (both retailers and their suppliers) have been granted approval to operate in what is considered the nation's largest market.
  
  As of 2018, Los Angeles is home to three Fortune 500 companies: AECOM, CBRE Group, and Reliance Steel & Aluminum Co. Other companies headquartered in Los Angeles and the surrounding metropolitan area include The Aerospace Corporation, California Pizza Kitchen, Capital Group Companies, Deluxe Entertainment Services Group, Dine Brands Global, DreamWorks Animation, Dollar Shave Club, Fandango Media, Farmers Insurance Group, Forever 21, Hulu, Panda Express, SpaceX, Ubisoft Film & Television, The Walt Disney Company, Universal Pictures, Warner Bros., Warner Music Group, and Trader Joe's.
  
  At the end of the second quarter of 2024, Los Angeles saw an office space vacancy rate of 31.5%, a 33.5% increase year-over-year. Retail vacancy stood at 8.6%, a 15% increase year-over-year.
  
  As of 2025, Los Angeles is the largest city in the United States to not be home to a Federal Reserve Bank.