South By North Strategies, Ltd.

Around The Dial – September 28, 2011

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

• Felix Salmon points out problems with GDP accounting.
• Mark Thoma argues for the independence of the Federal Reserve.
• Working Economics lays out nine reasons for investing in infrastructure.
• The Progressive Pulse runs down arguments for and against a payroll tax holiday.

Manufacturing In The South Atlantic: September 2011

From the Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond’s latest survey of manufacturing activity in the South Atlantic (District of Columbia, Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia and West Virginia):

Manufacturing activity in the central Atlantic region contracted at a less pronounced rate this month, according to the Richmond Fed’s latest survey. Looking at the main components of activity, employment grew at a slightly quicker rate, while shipments exhibited more moderate weakness and new orders slipped further into negative territory. Evidence of diminished weakness was also reflected in most other indicators. District contacts reported that backlogs, capacity utilization, and delivery times remained negative but improved from August’s readings. Manufacturers reported somewhat quicker growth in finished goods inventories.
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Looking forward, manufacturers’ assessments of business prospects for the next six months were more optimistic in September. Contacts at more firms anticipated that shipments, new orders, backlogs, and capacity utilization would grow more quickly during the next six months than they expected in August, while growth in capital expenditures would be slower.

Joblessness Heads South

A recent story in The New York Times reported in the spike in unemployment in the American South.

The once-booming South, which entered the recession with the lowest unemployment rate in the nation, is now struggling with some of the highest rates, recent data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics show.
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Several Southern states — including South Carolina, whose 11.1 percent unemployment rate is the fourth highest in the nation — have higher unemployment rates than they did a year ago. Unemployment in the South is now higher than it is in the Northeast and the Midwest, which include Rust Belt states that were struggling even before the recession.
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For decades, the nation’s economic landscape consisted of a prospering Sun Belt and a struggling Rust Belt. Since the recession hit, though, that is no longer the case. Unemployment remains high across much of the country — the national rate is 9.1 percent — but the regions have recovered at different speeds.

Around The Dial – September 27, 2011

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

• Brad DeLong reviews the economic performance of the Obama administration.
• Simon Johnson looks at last weekend’s meeting of the IMF.
• Jared Bernstein points out that power dynamics matter more than message frames.
• Rortybomb wonders if student loans are a form of indenture.

Poverty Rises Across North Carolina

A recent brief from the N.C. Budget and Tax Center breaks down the latest poverty data for North Carolina. The analysis is based on 2010 figures from the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey.

The Census’ American Community Survey recorded a large jump in poverty in North Carolina, from 14.3 percent in 2007 to 17.5 percent in 2010. That puts nearly 1.6 million North Carolinians living in poverty, or making at or below $22,314 annually for a family of four. More than 728,000 million North Carolinians were living in deep poverty, meaning they earn just half of the annual income threshold identified above as the federal poverty line.
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Overall, the poverty rate in urban counties in the state was 19.1 percent, 3.7 percentage points higher than rural poverty. A more detailed look shows that many counties in more rural parts of the state had some of the highest poverty rates. Robeson County had nearly 1 in 3 residents living in poverty while Rutherford and Wilson Counties had more than 1 in 5 residents living in poverty — these statistics represent the highest county‐level poverty rates for which data is available. Urban counties, like Wake and Mecklenburg, had some of the largest increases in poverty rates over the Great Recession with 44.6 and 43 percent increases respectively.