Category: Labor and Workforce
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Hampton Roads the Dragging Anchor on Virginia Job Growth
We’ve talked a lot on this blog about Virginia’s ailing mill-town economy. But the real economic laggard is Hampton Roads. Based on July 2017 Bureau of Labor Statistics data, all but one of Virginia’s metropolitan regions achieved job growth compared to 12 months previously. Hampton Roads lost 0.4% of its jobs. Harrisonburg showed the strongest…
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Should We Subsidize Rural Economies?
Last week I offered a point-by-point review of Democratic gubernatorial candidate Ralph Northam’s plan to revitalize rural Virginia. In rough summary, I concluded that the plan wouldn’t accomplish much, but on the other hand, it wouldn’t cost much either. The Northam proposals had considerably more merit than a lot of ideas — such as a…
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Northam’s Affordable, Not-So-Ambitious Plan for Reviving Rural Virginia
Ralph Northam, Democratic Party candidate for governor, grew up on the Eastern Shore, so it’s not surprising that he has given considerable thought to the challenges of economic development in Virginia’s small towns and rural communities. Earlier this week, he unveiled his plan for economic growth in rural Virginia. If you’re looking for a “Marshall…
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Taking a Peek Behind the CNBC Best-State-for-Business Ranking
Governor Terry McAuliffe said yesterday that he was “thrilled” Virginia had moved up six spots to 7th place in CNBC’s Best States for Business 2017 rankings — and when McAuliffe says he’s thrilled, you can take that to the bank. Whatever else you think about the job he’s done as governor, there is no denying…
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How Computer Games Are Sapping the Initiative of Young Men and Shrinking the Workforce
We’re all familiar with the stereotype of the young male slacker, disinterested in looking for work and holed up in his parents’ basement, wiling away the time surfing the Web or playing computer games. Many of us have observed such behavior in our own homes. (I’m not mentioning any names.) Now four economists writing for…
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Drip… Drip… Drip… Another Richmond Company Moves from the Burbs to Downtown
The Hilb Group, a fast-growing insurance brokerage with more than $125 million in revenue, has made the decision to move its headquarters from the suburban Stony Point office to the Riverfront Plaza in downtown Richmond. CEO Bob Hilb told Richmond BizSense that he had been looking for a new location for a year in anticipation…
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Charts of the Day: Job Polarization
The good news in the ongoing evolution of Virginia’s economy is that employment in high-paying occupations has increased since 2008. The bad news is that employment in low-paying occupations has risen as well while employment in middle-class occupations is shrinking. Kathryn Crespin with the Demographics Research Group at the University of Virginia published these charts…
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Marriage, Fertility and Male Earnings
One of the great debates in the social science of poverty asks what accounts for the decline in marriage and the increase in out-of-wedlock births. There is a broad consensus among scholars of diverse ideological persuasions that children born into stable marriages tend to fare better in life than those raised by single mothers. The question…
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The Marketplace is Speaking. Are the Counties Listening?
After CoStar Group, a provider of real estate market intelligence, announced last fall its intention to move its research division headquarters to downtown Richmond, the company offered employees from Washington, D.C., Atlanta, San Diego, and Columbia, Md., an opportunity to move to Virginia. A big concern of Senior Vice President Lisa Ruggles was how many…
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Business and Computer Science Majors are the Biggest Bargains in Higher Ed
It is widely known that certain college majors offer better career prospects than others. Engineering and business majors earn more money on average than, say, art and English majors. Less well known is the fact that certain majors are more expensive to teach. As seen in the chart above, engineering graduates cost twice as much to…
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Fudging Differences between Legal and Illegal Immigrants
Immigrants residing in Virginia are better educated and more entrepreneurial than commonly perceived, says a new report by the Commonwealth Institute (CI), “Virginia Immigrants in the Economy.” That’s true. Yet immigrants’ contributions to the U.S. economy are often minimized by “some state and federal lawmakers,” adds a press release accompanying the report. In truth, immigrants make our…
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Virginia Ranks 6th in Tech Employment
From the “Cyberstates 2017” research report… Virginia tech employment (2016): 291,312 National rank: 6 Increase from previous year: 4,145 jobs Percent of overall workforce: 7.7% Average tech industry wages in Virginia (2016): $112,014 National rank: 7
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What the Obama Giveth, the Trump Taketh Away
The federal budget sequestration may have kept a lid on escalating federal budget deficits, a good thing, but it was a disaster for Virginia’s economy. The cap on federal spending hammered a Northern Virginia economy built largely around the Pentagon. The ascension of Donald Trump to the presidency signaled a possible return to the region’s…
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For-Profit Colleges and the Student Debt Apocalypse
Tressie McMillan Cottom worked as an enrollment officer at two for-profit technical colleges before she went on to earn a PhD., join the faculty of Virginia Commonwealth University, and write a book, “Lower Ed: The Troubling Rise of For-Profit Colleges in the New Economy.” Cottom says that for-profit colleges get one important thing right: They invest…
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The Northam/Perriello Rural Poverty Plan
Both Democratic candidates for governor, Ralph Northam and Tom Perriello, have endorsed a statewide $15-per-hour minimum wage, a sign, says the Washington Post, of how much momentum the national “Fight for $15” is achieving. (Virginia hews to the federal minimum wage of $7.25 per hour, which has not increased since 2009.) Perriello backed the $15 minimum…