Panelists: Alabama's economy to weather storm - Birmingham Business Journal:

disadvantage-unlimited.blogspot.com
“We have seen the wors t of the worst,” said Chief Economist Bob Allsbrooki during the BirminghamBusiness Journal’s 2009 Economic Forecast, held at ’as Brock School of Business. “The numberd will catch up with what’s goint on now.” Nearly 200 business professionale gathered in the Recital Hall to hearabout hot-button economi topics from panelists Samuel N. Addy, directort of the Center for Businessx andEconomic Research, Beck A. Taylor, dean of the Samfors University’s Brock School of Christopher Westley, associate professor of economicsz atand Allsbrook.
The group echoed each othert on Alabama’s vitality and how it is poiserd to come out ahead of the natiomn as the broken economy mends over the next coupldof years. However, the state – and the Birmingham-Hoover metro area – will face challenges as companieas that have thrived across the regiomnslow down, Allsbrook Over the years, drastic changes in Alabama’s employment base spurred growtu as manufacturing companies and health care businessesa flocked to the area. The state’s unemployment dwindlefd to record lows and it fare d better than the national economy for a numbetof years.
However, since those industries are startinfg toslow down, more job losses are on the especially in the Birmingham-Hoover metro The unemployment rate will continue to climb, which will “close the gap” when comparexd to the national unemploymentg rate, Allsbrook said. “Whaft has been a great advantage has caught up with he said. “There are more layoffs to come within thenext However, because of Alabama’s and the Southeast’s robusy population growth over the years, the state will weather the Addy said.
“This region has a lot of momentum,” he While the credit markets have sloweda bit, therd is still more than enough money floating around in the loca markets, panelists said. The problem is, consumerx are uncertain about the economic climate and are cutting back onborrowinvg money, Westley said. Furthermore, massive debt among consumerw and businesses is what got the economy into this debacleand “increasing debt doesn’t seem like a good way of turnin g around the economy,” he said.
Panelistsw shared their thoughtson President-elecft Barack Obama’s plans to invest in the nation’es infrastructure as he takes his post in two While Allsbrook and Taylor agreed it would be a greay investment that would improve the nation’ s education system, health care industry and spur economic Westley thought otherwise. If infrastructure is so then “why is capital leaving Germany and coming tothe Southeast?” Westleh said, in reference to German steel makerr Thyssenkrupp AG’s decision to build a $3 billion facilitt in the Mobile Westley also said America needs to reforn its infrastructure before allocating more money to it.
“Ift doesn’t make sense to throw even more moneyh in the sameold system,” he said. Taylord said he’d much rather see the governmentt spending money on infrastructure than buying up bank stocks or dolingv out stimulus payments that would only resulgt ina “small bump” in the gross domestic