Outlook is grim, but N.C. has advantages

Michael Walden is the William Neal Reynolds Distinguished Professor in NCSU's Department of Agriculture and Resource Economics and the author of a new book, "North Carolina In The Connected Age."

Q: The unemployed: Will it be worse than in '83?

A: I think it has the potential to be worse. I think we could, by 2010, see North Carolina's unemployment rate reach double-digit levels before we begin to see an improvement.

Q: What's different this time around?

A: On the bad side, we are of course tied into the national economy, and we are looking at a very severe recession at the national level, ... potentially the worse economic downtown since World War II. On the good side, North Carolina has dramatically restructured its economy since the early '80s. We have shifted away from many of our traditional manufacturing sections to new sectors. That shift is largely complete. While I am somewhat pessimistic about the immediate trends in employment, I don't think North Carolina will suffer more than the nation, as we did in the last recession.

Q: Put some faces on the numbers. Who will struggle the most to find work in the months to come?

A: Unfortunately, it tends to be people who are at the lower end of the economic ladder because they are often those with lower levels of training and education. So they are dispensable to businesses. High school dropouts and high school graduates will suffer more than college graduates with advanced degrees. The economy is putting much more emphasis on advanced training, and workers with advanced training tend to be the most important workers.