Greater Worcester

Lawmakers opted to give shoppers a break from the state's sales tax on the third weekend of August, under a compromise economic development bill.

Single-family home sales dropped for the fifth consecutive month, according to data released Tuesday by the Massachusetts Association of Realtors (MAR).

Taiwan may be small, but the island state of 23 million people is vital to the Central Massachusetts economy.

The former site of the Worcester Sam's Club store has been sold for $3.2 million, according to Worcester real estate broker Glickman Kovago & Co., which represented the buyer, The Aster Group, also of Worcester.

Worcester attorney and Hanover Insurance Group Chairman Michael Angelini has been selected to lead the seven-member board that oversees the Massachusetts Port Authority, which oversees commercial aviation in the commonwealth.

Global sales for Illinois-based drug firm AbbVie rose 5 percent in the second quarter, driven primarily by a 26-percent jump in sales for its arthritis drug Humira.

The Federated Cos., a national real estate investment group with offices in Boston and Miami, has purchased the property on Worcester's Cambridge Street that includes a Price Chopper supermarket.

Second-quarter revenue and earnings for JetBlue Airways Corp., the only commercial passenger airline that flies out of Worcester, took off as higher traffic pushed up revenue to $1.5 billion for the quarter and the company benefited from the sale of a subsidiary.

The Tufts Health Plan Foundation has announced more than $1.6 million in new funding to 43 Massachusetts and Rhode Island-based organizations, including two from Worcester, as part of its first cycle of funding for 2014.

Where does Northern Ireland turn when it looks to develop the next generation of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) professionals? Worcester.