Navigating Federal Regulation: How Policies Impact Regional Businesses

Click here to view a recording of this webinar.

Click here to view the slides from this webinar.

In today’s fast-paced and complex business environment, government regulations play a critical role in shaping your regional landscape. In this webinar, we explored the impact of government regulation on businesses of all sizes and types. We’ll delve into the different types of regulation, with a particular focus on recent EPA regulations regarding emissions and water quality. 

Using REMI E3+, we demonstrated how public and private stakeholders can analyze increases in cost of production due to government regulation, as well as the environmental impacts. Presenter Jeffrey Dykes also provided commentary on why this type of analysis is crucial for the long-term health of utilities and private businesses. 

Mental Health and the Wealth of Regions

Click here to view the slides from this webinar.

Click here to view a recording of this webinar.

Region 1 Planning Council presented on the relationship between mental health and workforce productivity, highlighting recent research on the subject, and modeling the potential impacts of reduced workforce productivity due to increased mental health issues stemming from the COVID-19 pandemic. They also explored the potential economic impacts of mitigating a percentage of productivity losses through increasing access to mental health services.

Speakers:

Jason Holcomb
Director of Community Impact at Region 1 Planning Council

Jason is a 40 under 40 leader, with a tenacious passion for mental health. Having worked many years in the community mental health and disability sector, Jason sees mental health as foundational to the success of a community. He has been trained in multiple collaborative approaches and brings a collaborative innovation lens to funding, project development, and community building. Currently, Jason serves as Director of Community Impact for Region 1 Planning Council and through intergovernmental agreement, manages the day to day operations of the Winnebago County Community Mental Health Board (WCCMHB), allocating funding from the 1/2 cent sales tax for mental health in Winnebago County.  He has a master’s degree in social work (MSW) focused in leadership from Indiana University School of Social Work.

Rashaad Pierre
Data Analyst at Region 1 Planning Council

Rashaad Pierre is a 2021 graduate from Northern Illinois University with a B.S. in Applied Mathematics and a minor in Statistics. After several jobs in the service industry, Rashaad is excited to apply his education in the public sector as a Data Analyst at Region 1 Planning Council (R1). Rashaad had focused on many different topics during his undergrad such as model building, proof writing, statistics and performing calculations. Rashaad is new to the field of data Analytics but he is excited to build his project portfolio at R1.

 

2022 State of the Commonwealth

Click here to access the 2022 State of the Commonwealth Report

Click here to view the slides from this presentation

Click here to view a recording of this presentation

Each year the Dragas Center for Economic Analysis and Policy at Old Dominion University releases a State of the Commonwealth Report that reviews the Virginia economy and contributes to discussions about the future outlook for Virginia residents. The report seeks to tackle foreseen difficulties head-on and provide information that can be used to inform policy decisions to improve economic situations for all stakeholders.

Bob McNab and James Koch will discuss the state of Virginia’s economy, examining how defense appropriations, inflation, and increased interest rates impacted the Commonwealth in 2022 and the prospects for 2023. They will also explore the supply of lawyers in Virginia and whether the Commonwealth is producing too many lawyers and what the future may hold for the legal profession in Virginia and the nation. Dr. McNab and Dr. Koch will provide context for these issues and how they will impact Virginia residents.

Presenters:

Bob McNab
Chair of the Department of Economics and Director of the Dragas Center for Economic Analysis and Policy

Professor Robert M. McNab currently serves as the Chair of the Department of Economics and Director of the Dragas Center for Economic Analysis and Policy and in the Strome College of Business at Old Dominion University. He is a member of the Joint Advisory Board of Economists for the Commonwealth of Virginia, the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia’s Survey of Professional Forecasters and is an Associate Editor with the Journal of Economic Surveys. Professor McNab has published in Applied Economics, Cornell Hospitality Quarterly, Defense and Peace Economics, National Tax Journal, Public Budgeting and Finance, and World Development, among others. He edits the annual State of the Region: Hampton Roads and State of the Commonwealth reports Professor McNab has appeared in the Associated Press, China Global Television Network, CNN, Newsweek, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Yahoo News, Yahoo Finance, Richmond Times-Dispatch, Virginian Pilot, and Daily Press, among others. Dr. McNab joined the faculty of the Department of Economics in the Strome College of Business of Old Dominion University in July 2016 and previously was a member of the faculty of the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California from 2000 to 2016.

James Koch
Board of Visitors Professor of Economics Emeritus and President Emeritus at Old Dominion University

James V. Koch (“cook”) is Board of Visitors Professor of Economics Emeritus and President Emeritus at Old Dominion University.  Prior to becoming the President of Old Dominion, he served as President of University of Montana.  He was selected as one of the 100 most effective college presidents in the United States.

Dr. Koch is an economist.  A portion of his recent published economic research has focused on college costs and affordability and the special roles that Historically Black Colleges and Universities occupy in American higher education.  This work has appeared in books published by the Brookings Institution, the Johns Hopkins University Press, and the Columbia University Press.

But he is with us today because of his research concerning the incomes earned by America’s lawyers.  In short, and in contrast to what many individuals believe to be the case, he shows that the real, price-adjusted median income of a lawyer in the United States has declined since 2000.  But we will let him tell this story.  

Budget Forecasting Solutions with REMI

Click here to view slides from this presentation.

Click here to view a recording of this presentation.

This webinar was hosted by David Casazza, an Associate at REMI.

State and local government agencies need an intuitive and powerful dynamic impact model that can be used to analyze induced fiscal and economic effects of taxation. REMI Tax-PI is backed by years of dependability, and has been trusted nationally by many different government organizations as the only widely-available model that shows both the dynamic economic and fiscal effects of policy as a means to inform public policy.

In this webinar, REMI associate David Casazza will demonstrate how REMI Tax-PI has been used to shape and model state and local tax changes, state and local fiscal budgets, and education and infrastructure investments. We encourage anybody who has any questions about our tax modeling capabilities to attend, as there will be time at the end of the presentation for Mr. Casazza to answer your questions.

The Community Economic Effects of New Distribution Centers: How We Used REMI

Click here to view the report

Click here to view a recording of this webinar

Distribution centers, or fulfillment centers, are a crucial piece of the overall economy, and this has become increasingly true as online commerce continues to grow. More distribution centers have become necessary to meet the increase in demand caused by Covid-19 and related online shopping trends. Still, some critics believe that these centers are harmful to local economies. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce conducted an analysis of the direct and indirect regional economic impacts of distribution centers to test this claim.

In this webinar, Mr. Dubay will discuss how these distribution centers affect Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSAs) through direct job creation and the associated ripple effect in communities. Mr. Dubay will use case studies and the REMI model as the backbone of his analysis.

 

Speaker:
Curtis Dubay
Chief Economist
U.S. Chamber of Commerce

Curtis Dubay is the Chief Economist at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. He tracks the condition of the economy, analyzes the impact of public policy on economic growth, and runs the Chamber’s Chief Economists Committee. Previously, he was senior economist at the American Bankers Association and a research fellow in tax and economic policy at The Heritage Foundation. He  also worked at the accounting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) and at the Tax Foundation.

Dubay has researched and published frequently on a wide range of tax and economic issues. He is regularly quoted by the press and has appeared often in the media, including on CNBC, Fox Business, Fox News, and C-SPAN. He has testified before Congress several times and been cited in newspapers such as The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Washington Post, USA Today, and Politico.

Dubay received his master’s degree in economics from the University of Connecticut and his bachelor’s degree in economics and leadership studies from the University of Richmond. He resides in Washington, D.C., with his wife and three sons.