Economic Development Strategy and Institutions

[kermit]

Good news, IMO. The Chamber and the Charlotte Regional Partnership are 'near' a merger. They plan to have a national search for a new CEO once terms have been reached.  If things go according to plan the new ED organization will begin on January 1 and the Chamber and CRP will no longer exist.

https://www.bizjournals.com/charlotte/news/2018/09/13/charlotte-chamber-regional-partnership-near-merger.html

As we saw with the Amazon and Apple competition, Charlotte badly needs to streamline its recruitment process -- companies and consultants have been complaining that its not clear who they should contact and communicate with when investigating Charlotte.  This merger would be a good first step, but even after its done there will still be a thick patchwork of city and county ED offices that will still want their fingers in the proverbial pie. We really need a one stop-shop who are able to pull the important levers and deftly interface with whoever is in charge in Raleigh.

 

Edited September 14, 2018 by kermit

[J-Rob]

This is good news.  FYI.  This thread exists in a similar format already: Economic Development - Expansions and Relocations.

 

[rancenc]

Wonderful news on the economic front with the rise of entrepreneurism throughout the state.  Who knows how quickly some of these business can become "the next big thing"!

https://www.thecentersquare.com/north_carolina/north-carolina-experiences-sharp-rise-in-entrepreneurship-amid-covid-19-pandemic/article_1bed6e3a-8680-11eb-ab72-17c6adb91223.html

[Guest]

Wrong thread!

Edited March 17, 2021 by Guest

[nicholas]

Could we just merge this into the other thread?

[rancenc]

North Carolina in national rankings!!

https://www.whqr.org/local/2021-05-05/new-study-ranks-north-carolina-among-top-states-in-competitive-corporate-taxes

 

[kermit]

Interesting city comparison tool from Hahvid:

https://metroverse.cid.harvard.edu/city/707/similar-cities?benchmark=global_pop

These are NOT flattering comparisons. I don’t get their model -at all-.

EDIT: While it seems clear that these data and or indexing methods are garbage, people who are not familiar with Charlotte may be making decisions based on these data.

 

Edited June 23, 2021 by kermit

[Blue_Devil]

1 hour ago, kermit said:

Interesting city comparison tool from Hahvid:

https://metroverse.cid.harvard.edu/city/707/similar-cities?benchmark=global_pop

The are NOT flattering comparisons, but I don’t get their model at all.

 

What the hell. My first thought was banking, but only London is similar there. 

[turbocraig]

34 minutes ago, Blue_Devil said:

What the hell. My first thought was banking, but only London is similar there. 

Judging from the other cities in that ring, maybe they mean London, Arkansas.

[CLT2014]

Their data is junk on the size of our city per the "What is my city's economic composition": "Charlotte⁩ has a population of ⁨370.5 thousand⁩ people (⁨2015⁩) and an estimated GDP per capita of $⁨60.7 thousand⁩. Out of the ⁨346⁩ cities covered in ⁨the Americas⁩, ⁨Charlotte⁩ ranks as the ⁨155th⁩ most populated, and displays the ⁨61st⁩ highest GDP per capita. ⁨Charlotte's⁩ labor force consists of about ⁨402.8 thousand⁩ workers."

Hence our "similar" cities are metros in the 100,000 to 700,000 range.  Also, somehow we have more workers than total people. LOL.

Edited June 23, 2021 by CLT2014

[atlrvr]

It's actually London, Ontario I suspect. 

That said, complete junk.

[davidclt]

20 hours ago, Blue_Devil said:

What the hell. My first thought was banking, but only London is similar there. 

[kermit]

TBJ has a story on declining membership in their various chambers of commerce. Local small firms reduced their connection with chambers during the pandemic and big new corporate arrivals (Apple, Google) appear to be disinterested in participating. This is certainly not unique to the Triangle, membership (and thus revenue) at the Charlotte Chamber (I can never remember its new name) has been declining for years and this has made it difficult to raise salaries, thus they have seen a good bit of turnover and had some staff recruiting problems.

This is a looming issue for both the Triangle and Charlotte. Chambers were once the first, and lead contact point for economic development, but as that role gets shifted to the state office, there is likely to be a political reflex to soft pedal ED projects in large metros while working hard on rural projects which are lower-productivity and low-wage opportunities.

https://www.bizjournals.com/triangle/news/2021/07/23/business-booster-groups-struggle-with-membership.html

[kermit]

This is kinda off-topic and also sour grapes on my part, but I thought it was interesting.

Georgia did an audit on their film incentives program, discovered it has one of the worst ROI’s of any ED program I have ever seen. One billion in incentives brought back less than $300 million in revenue.

https://www.audits2.ga.gov/reports/summaries/tie-georgias-film-tax-credit/

I will concede these sorts of audits are subject to mountains of political influence and manipulation. So the numbers should be viewed with caution, and it could just be that the state wants the program to end for other reasons.

[videtur quam contuor]

schadenfreude

[KJHburg]

Interesting about Georgia but does that take into account the property taxes on all the studios they have all the state mainly in the Atlanta area.  I know they are all kinds of sales tax refunds etc they do that in NC.  What about the income taxes of the people working there?  I have rumblings about Georgia tax incentives for movies and tv shows being too generous. 

 

[atlrvr]

I believe it...film credits are pretty terrible because of their lack of long term value creation.  It's usually just 1 time activity to tax, with many (most?) of the labor being non local.  Film studio property taxes are pretty small.  They are cheap buildings on cheap land, and most of the equipment can be rapidly depreciated for tax purposes.

Films are pure vanity as far as economic activity, but so are sports and other projects, so not saying we shouldn't pursue them, just we shouldn't expect any sort of direct economic return.