Faculty News
Newsmakers
- Faculty News Home
- More Faculty Research
- News Home
- Research Ranking
- Faculty News Archive
- Featured Faculty
- Faculty research
- Bookshelf
In his "State of the State" address in January, South Carolina's Gov. Mark Sanford cited research
by
Dr. Donald L. Schunk, assistant professor of economics and
research economist at the Moore School of Business, about the state's labor force growth.
"Our labor force grew by 45,000 last year," said Sanford in an address broadcast live on television and radio, "and in the last three months alone it has grown by 1.7 percent - the fastest growth rate in the continental United States. In the short run, labor force growth bumps up our unemployment numbers, but according to Don Schunk of the Moore School of Business, in the long run it can mean good things for our economy. It means someone is loading up a U-Haul rental trailer and leaving Michigan because they think South Carolina represents greater opportunity. In the short run, that lowers Michigan's unemployment rate and raises ours, but in the long run, we will be better off for these folks making South Carolina home."
The nation's first upscale, luxury lounge
dedicated to the smoking of cigarettes, especially a new R.J. Reynolds variety, doesn't violate the
city of Chicago's new smoking ban, according to
Brian Stebbins (MIBS '00), who is a senior marketing
director at R.J. Reynolds. The new Marshall McGearty Tobacco Lounge, in a "hip neighborhood" on
Chicago's North Side, fits the exempt category of a "tobacco retail store," Stebbins told
The New York Times in an article in its Jan. 19, 2006,
edition. The Chicago ordinance excludes retail tobacco stores from the smoking ban in places where
65 percent of the sales are of tobacco or tobacco accessories. "This is about a select, super
premium brand of cigarettes, just like what we've seen with the super premium tier of beer, wine,
chocolate and pastries. It's about elegance and having fun," Stebbins said. The shop features thick
jars of tobacco ("Oriental Rose," "The Empress," "The Earl,") that are poured into white smoking
papers. The lounge also sells alcoholic drinks, cheese plates, and espresso drinks.
It would be a "losing battle" for South Carolina to use protectionist measures to try to insulate its ailing textile industry from competition with
Chinese-made textiles,
Dr. Chuck C.Y. Kwok, professor of international business,
said on the Oct. 23, 2005, segment of "Newswatch" that was aired on WIS-TV, Columbia's NBC-TV
affiliate. Instead of protectionism, the state should shift to producing higher-end textile fabrics
that could be bought by the increasingly large middle class in China and by consumers elsewhere in
the world, Kwok said. Because of China's huge population, China's middle class is "very large," he
said. "Those people are now making good money and want to have very high-quality products to
consume." (Textile leaders say that many of the 37,600 textile jobs lost in South Carolina since
September 2000 were because of China's exports of textiles and clothing to the United States.)
Kwok, who was raised in Hong Kong, also said that it was "very open-minded and far-sighted" of the state of South Carolina to have opened a trade office last fall in Shanghai. "This is a wonderful, pro-active attitude," he said. "Forging relationships like this in China is very important."
"Our labor force grew by 45,000 last year," said Sanford in an address broadcast live on television and radio, "and in the last three months alone it has grown by 1.7 percent - the fastest growth rate in the continental United States. In the short run, labor force growth bumps up our unemployment numbers, but according to Don Schunk of the Moore School of Business, in the long run it can mean good things for our economy. It means someone is loading up a U-Haul rental trailer and leaving Michigan because they think South Carolina represents greater opportunity. In the short run, that lowers Michigan's unemployment rate and raises ours, but in the long run, we will be better off for these folks making South Carolina home."
The nation's first upscale, luxury lounge
dedicated to the smoking of cigarettes, especially a new R.J. Reynolds variety, doesn't violate the
city of Chicago's new smoking ban, according to
Brian Stebbins (MIBS '00), who is a senior marketing
director at R.J. Reynolds. The new Marshall McGearty Tobacco Lounge, in a "hip neighborhood" on
Chicago's North Side, fits the exempt category of a "tobacco retail store," Stebbins told
The New York Times in an article in its Jan. 19, 2006,
edition. The Chicago ordinance excludes retail tobacco stores from the smoking ban in places where
65 percent of the sales are of tobacco or tobacco accessories. "This is about a select, super
premium brand of cigarettes, just like what we've seen with the super premium tier of beer, wine,
chocolate and pastries. It's about elegance and having fun," Stebbins said. The shop features thick
jars of tobacco ("Oriental Rose," "The Empress," "The Earl,") that are poured into white smoking
papers. The lounge also sells alcoholic drinks, cheese plates, and espresso drinks.
It would be a "losing battle" for South Carolina to use protectionist measures to try to insulate its ailing textile industry from competition with
Chinese-made textiles,
Dr. Chuck C.Y. Kwok, professor of international business,
said on the Oct. 23, 2005, segment of "Newswatch" that was aired on WIS-TV, Columbia's NBC-TV
affiliate. Instead of protectionism, the state should shift to producing higher-end textile fabrics
that could be bought by the increasingly large middle class in China and by consumers elsewhere in
the world, Kwok said. Because of China's huge population, China's middle class is "very large," he
said. "Those people are now making good money and want to have very high-quality products to
consume." (Textile leaders say that many of the 37,600 textile jobs lost in South Carolina since
September 2000 were because of China's exports of textiles and clothing to the United States.)
Kwok, who was raised in Hong Kong, also said that it was "very open-minded and far-sighted" of the state of South Carolina to have opened a trade office last fall in Shanghai. "This is a wonderful, pro-active attitude," he said. "Forging relationships like this in China is very important."