“When the federal government threatened to close the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard [in 2005], the workers, lawmakers, local businesses and the community at large came together to fight to keep it open. It seemed like we had everybody against us: the Navy, the Secretary of Defense, the whole Pentagon. But we had the facts, and we had unity. And together, we kept open the best shipyard in the country.
We have with us today two of the workers who helped lead that fight, Paul O’Conner and JJ Joyal.
Now, there are plans for a new round of base closures. Well we stand ready. We’re not going to let them close our shipyard! This is not a partisan issue. On this, I know all of New Hampshire will stand together. Continue Reading →
Governor John Lynch pauses his speech to applaud, along with First Lady Susan Lynch (left) and House Speaker Bill O'Brien (right)
Today marked Governor John Lynch’s last State of the State address. And, as one might expect during a slow trudge toward recovery, the bulk of Lynch focused either directly or indirectly on the economy. Some of the key themes included issues that we’ve covered or put on the Watch List of our Ultimate Legislative Guide. We’ve singled-out some of Lynch’s key economic comments below.
But before we cut to the highlights reel, we couldn’t resist visualizing the speech’s themes in a word cloud. And, as one might expect from the Governor whose signature line is, “We live in the greatest state in the greatest country in the world,” the words “New Hampshire” and “people” dominate the illustration. Continue Reading →
This renewed focus got us thinking about what New Hampshire’s fabrication sector looks like now, and how it compares to other states in the region.
And fortunately, the US Census Bureau recently released a nifty interactive map that helps us do exactly that. The map itself is well worth checking out. But for our purposes, we’ll be looking at information from the interactive table feature . After fussing with a bit of data, here’s a screenshot of the table we created:
These are our five posts you've dug the most this week
It was a varied news week for the business and economy beat–as our traffic patterns proved. Our most popular pieces covered issues ranging from the State of the Union address to green jobs to Northern Pass and credit card debt. So if you missed any of the five key posts our readers are talking about, we’ve your weekly roundup of the Essential StateImpact ready to roll.
How A Start-Up Incubator Is Racing Against The Clock To Create Jobs: Our top post this week takes you inside a stimulus-funded green business (and jobs) incubator–the Green Launching Pad. We look at where it’s succeeded, where it’s potentially struggling, and how effective it’s been at jump starting the state’s green economy.
Study: NH Ranks #2 In US For Credit Card Debt: Purported Yankee frugality aside, new data shows the Granite State is near the top of the heap in terms of credit card debt. We look into why, and provide tables showing how New Hampshire stacks-up to the country’s highest- and lowest-debt states. Continue Reading →
But what interested us even more than the overarching sentiment toward eminent domain was how opinions broke down along various demographic lines.
Right now, the study’s not posted on the University of New Hampshire Survey Center site where most Granite State Polls live. But luckily for us, the Monitor went ahead and linked to a scanned copy of the report, which included several pages of demographic data. So this week, we went ahead and crunched some numbers to try to give you a fuller picture of what Northern Pass eminent domain opposition–and support–looks like. Continue Reading →
Cutting down on red tape is one of the primary goals for GOP leadership this session
As we’ve noted previously, deregulation is one of the major themes the Legislature will be tackling this session. On TheLobbyNH.com, reporter Kevin Landrigan notes that, “Well below the radar, the Commission to Study Business Regulations has been meeting and today [Thursday] is expected to vote on its final report.”
Landrigan writes The Lobby managed to get its hands on the interim draft report–which the Business & Industry Association played no small role in creating. The report proposes some major changes in current regulations: Continue Reading →
We'll be keeping track of some of the big economic issues working their way through the statehouse
As the New Hampshire legislature begins whittling down a bevy of economy-related bills, we thought it would be helpful to offer you a brief, on-going roundup of what we believe are some key economic issues the General Court will be looking at, and why. We’ve also included resources if you’d like to research and track these issues on your own, or get in touch with the governor or your legislator.
This is not a comprehensive list of business- and economy-related legislation. But unlike most of our posts, this piece will be a living document. We’ll be keeping track of some key legislation, adding things to watch for, and otherwise updating the post as needed.
Starting tomorrow, this post will live in our “Topics” section, just below the search bar. (More often than not, it’ll also be making appearances in our Featured Topics menu right at the top of the site.) Any reporting or aggregating we’ve done–or related topics pages we’ve created–will be added to the bottom of this post for your perusal. Continue Reading →
The Occupy movement has popularized the notion of "the 99 percent." An interactive map breaks that figure down further
If you move past the front-page headlines, work your way past the daily business news, and descend into the depths of the New York Times website, there’s a reasonable chance you’ll encounter a cool, interactive infographic.
And it just so happens that today, we’ve found what we believe to be one of the Times‘ niftiest offerings to date. They’ve posted an interactive map that allows you to plug in your salary, and move your cursor over various states and counties to compare how your personal wealth (or lack thereof) stacks up. As an example, here’s a screen shot of what we found when we entered in New Hampshire’s median salary of $61,042 (which is among the highest in the country).
Check out our chat about one facet of NH's green economy
One of our most popular posts this week has been our in-depth look at the economic impact the Green Launching Pad, of an earth-friendly start-up incubator. The program was created with the help of federal stimulus money. StateImpact’s Amanda Loder discusses the economic impacts of GLP–and the program’s future–with NHPR’s All Things Considered host Brady Carlson.
In his State of the Union address, President Obama discussed a number of economic and jobs issues, especially manufacturing
The big story of the day is, of course, President Obama’s State of the Union address last night. Since the speech wrapped, analysis from politicos, pundits, and wonks has been pretty much non-stop.
As a business and economy site, we’re definitely interested in the overarching economic themes of the president’s address–and the Republican response. But rather than add our voice to the massive chorus of national-level analysis, we thought we’d offer you a piece of brain candy instead. Using transcripts of the State of the Union address–and the opposition response–we’ve created a pair of word clouds that illustrate the key themes of each speech. Continue Reading →
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