CHICAGO (AP) -- GE Capital plans to add 1,000 jobs in Chicago -- 500 of them in the next year.
At a news conference on Monday, executives with the financial services arm of GE and Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel said that the added jobs will nearly double the number of employees the company has in the city.
Emanuel says after he was elected he phoned General Electric CEO Jeff Immelt when Immelt was in Chicago and suggested the two meet. He says he knew Immelt from his days in Congress and as President Barack Obama's White House chief of staff.
Emanuel says their relationship may have helped push GE's expansion along. But he says GE isn't expanding as a favor but rather because the move makes economic sense for the company.