South By North Strategies, Ltd.

Two recent articles in the Triangle Business Journal featured the work and perspectives of South by North Strategies, Ltd.

The first piece featured South by North Strategies’ midyear review of North Carolina’s economy.

“The idea of a recovery itself was way overblown,” says John Quinterno, the report’s author. “We hit a point last summer where the free-fall stopped, but that’s not the same as a rebound.” Looking back over the downturn, Quinterno says the state lost 254,000 jobs, or 6.1 percent of the payroll job base, between December 2007 and May 2010. Between April 2009 and April 2010, the Triangle lost 0.8 percent of its job base. The Triangle base stood at 629,300 as of April 2010.

The second article reported on potential areas of growth in the Research Triangle’s economy.

“Manufacturing activity has stabilized, but we really haven’t seen that much growth,” says John Quinterno, an economist with South By North Strategies in Chapel Hill.
…
Quinterno points out that North Carolina needs to add some 5,500 positions per month to keep pace with growth in its work force. “If one considers the jobs that should have been created during the recession but were not, the actual gap facing the state is 422,000 positions,” Quinterno wrote on his blog.