U.S. Chamber: North Carolina Needs To Create 1 Million Jobs
America’s most pressing challenge is getting its citizens back to work, and U.S. Chamber of Commerce officials are traveling to North Carolina and across the country this week to help make that happen.
North Carolina needs to create almost 1.1 million jobs over the next decade to replace those lost in the recession and meet the needs of its growing workforce, chamber Chief Operating Officer David Chavern will announce Tuesday in Hickory. That’s part of a larger effort that challenges business and government leaders to add 20 million jobs nationwide.
Chavern spoke with the Observer today about the chamber’s plan to create jobs, why 1 million is realistic for North Carolina and why creating jobs should be the country’s No. 1 priority. Answers have been edited for brevity and clarity.
Q: Tell me about the chamber’s message and its efforts to spread the word at the grassroots level.
Part of it is trying to get people’s minds around the employment challenge we have in the U.S. We had economists estimate not only the jobs lost in this recession and underemployment, but also in the next 10 years, with all the people coming into the workforce, how would we employ those people? There were various estimates, but they all revolved around 20 million new jobs needed.
We thought it was important to get the public to focus on the size of the challenge and then talk about how you might begin to address it. The government isn’t going to provide these jobs. The government can do some things, but at the end of the day, it’s going to be the private sector that’s going to have to create the jobs.
Q: The chamber says North Carolina should create more than 1 million jobs. How did you come up with that number, and where will those jobs come from?
It was basically driven by the relative size of the economy, compared to the overall economy. North Carolina probably had 1/20 of the economy of the U.S. One million jobs is a big number for any state, but you’re not going to start addressing the problem until you define it.
One thing North Carolina can do is think about infrastructure development. There’s a tremendous need for infrastructure investments that employ people. And it’s not all government money. There’s a lot of potential private money out there for infrastructure development.
We’ve also got to think about the energy challenge we have ahead of us. There’s a lot of talk about clean energy, and that’s true, we should have incentives for clean energy manufacturing in the U.S., but there are more traditional forms like nuclear, too. The building of a nuclear plant employs something like 20,000 people.
Q: What sectors will lead this effort in North Carolina?
Clearly, there’s a solid manufacturing base, and I know in some areas, they’ve been hurting because of that, but there are manufacturing skills there. We need to look at, can we make some investments in new energy, green energy, technology, where they’re making those new products in North Carolina. There’s a range of things, from infrastructure to services. North Carolina is a leader in banking and financial services. I think North Carolina has a nicely diversified economy.
Q: What kinds of jobs would you like to see created, overall?
We definitely need to continue to revitalize the manufacturing sector. Manufacturing today is not what it was 50 years ago. I grew up in Pittsburgh, and if you had a strong back and a willingness to work, that was enough to get and sustain a manufacturing job. That’s not the case anymore. All jobs at all levels require an educated workforce, and fundamentally, we’ve got education problems in the U.S. and are not preparing workers for jobs. North Carolina has done better than a lot of states, but even the best states aren’t doing enough.
Q: What can state and local leaders do to create stronger workforces and more jobs?
One, focus on the education system. Two, try to have the best, most predictable business environment you can, with stable taxes and stable rules, where businesses know they can come in and make money. Another challenge is the local impediment to infrastructure and big projects.
There are hundreds of energy projects, including clean energy, that have been held up by local permitting disputes and lawsuits. Do we have the capacity to get out of our own way? “Not in my back yard” is a great way to not have jobs, either.
Q: Realistically, how soon can this hiring begin?
Obviously, I’d like it to start today. We do have some concerns about the economy. While it seems to have stabilized, we are concerned about a possible double-dip recession. We think this administration and Congress have not been sufficiently focused on getting the economy back on track. Let’s start today.
If we were able to reduce some of the regulatory uncertainty out there, get the financial system lending again, reduce uncertainty about taxes, and get some energy and other projects going, you could start to see us moving aggressively out of the recession by mid-year.
Q: Why does the chamber think it’s important to publicize the job-creation effort?
It’s people’s No. 1 priority. Until we get the economy moving, we can’t deal with other problems we need to address. We do need to address healthcare. We need to address energy and financial regulation, but it’s real hard to focus on those things when you have so many people unemployed.
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Sources: McClatchy Newspapers, Charlotte Observer, U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Google Maps
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