South By North Strategies, Ltd.

SBN Midyear Review Featured In Local Press

Last weekend, The High Point Enterprise devoted a full article to South by North Strategies’ recent midyear analysis of North Carolina’s labor market.  From the article written by reporter Paul Johnson …

A recent report by an economics research firm indicates that any incremental gains in hiring by private employers this year is partially negated by layoffs of government workers.
…
The report from South by North Strategies covers the first half of this year, which was a period before the state of North Carolina, county and municipal governments imposed any further public sector payroll cuts for the new fiscal year starting July 1.

The article concludes …

“I wouldn’t be surprised if, over the next several months, we continue to see the same dynamic of public sector job losses weighing on overall employment growth,” [John] Quinterno told The High Point Enterprise.
…
The demand for workers in the private sector in North Carolina isn’t strong enough now to absorb all the government employees losing their jobs, he said.

Job Openings In June

From the Economic Policy Institute’s analysis of the June version of the Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) …

The total number of job openings in June was 3.1 million, and the total number of unemployed workers was 14.1 million (unemployment is from the Current Population Survey). The ratio of unemployed workers to job openings was thus 4.5-to-1 in June, an improvement from the revised May ratio of 4.6-to-1, but still extremely high.  By comparison, in December 2000 the job-seeker’s ratio was 1.1-to-1, and the highest this ratio ever got in the early 2000s downturn was 2.8-to-1.

Around The Dial – August 15, 2011

Economic policy reports, blog postings, and media stories of interest:

• The Huffington Post reports on discrimination against the unemployed.
• Uwe Reinhardt asks if “Congress and the White House deserve an AA+ rating.”
• Daniel Gros summarizes the crisis in the Eurozone.
• Don Peck wonders if  the middle class can be saved.
• Gretchen Morgenson profiles Thomas Hoenig of the Kansas City Fed.

The Case For More Fiscal Stimulus

In an interview with the PBS NewsHour, Christina Romer, the former chair of the Council of Economic Advisers, makes the case for an additional round of economic stimulus.

Watch the full episode. See more PBS NewsHour.

Sapping Industrial Vitality

In a video interview with the Institute for New Economic Thinking,  Margaret Levenstein, an economic historian at the University of Michigan, explains the forces that caused innovation networks in Cleveland to break down.(Hint: financial speculation played a highly destructive role.)