The Lead Feed

The NC Today dashboard serves as a monthly update on statewide labor market and economic conditions. But what do the numbers mean? Using the March 2022 update, this third blog post in a series of four provides context to statewide taxable retail sales.
In April, not seasonally adjusted unemployment rates decreased in 83 of North Carolina's 100 counties.
During Q1 2021, NC saw more than 219,000 workers start new jobs. LEAD staff reviewed Census data to understand the NC industries that are most impacted by this job switching.
The NC Today dashboard serves as a monthly update on statewide labor market and economic conditions. But what do the numbers mean? Using the March 2022 update, this second blog post in a series of four provides context to statewide residential building permits.
North Carolina's seasonally adjusted unemployment rate decreased from March's revised rate of 3.5 percent.
The NC Today dashboard serves as a monthly update on statewide labor market and economic conditions. But what do the numbers mean? Using the March 2022 update, this first blog post in a series of four provides context to statewide total private average weekly earnings.
In March, not seasonally adjusted unemployment rates decreased in 85 of North Carolina's 100 counties.
The COVID-19 pandemic began in earnest around March 2020, with mass vaccinations beginning in the first quarter of 2021. How has the North Carolina economy changed across the worst of the crisis and its aftermath?
North Carolina's seasonally adjusted unemployment rate decreased from February's revised rate of 3.7 percent.
In February, not seasonally adjusted unemployment rates decreased in 50 of North Carolina's 100 counties.
Where will the economy be in 2023? This blog post presents highlights from the recently released 2021-2023 Short-Term Employment Projections.

The COVID-19 pandemic caused large and lasting disruptions to labor markets. While this disruption was happening, however, data reveals that the economy had a hidden strain of hope and resilience via growth in the births of new establishments and employment associated with those births. 

As North Carolina’s economy continues to recover from the recession caused by the COVID pandemic, we wanted to investigate how women’s employment and earnings were affected to complement other recent LEAD research.

In previous LEAD Feed posts, we examined changes in employment between men and women over the course of the pandemic. Data revealed that the number of employed women grew faster than that of men and without significantly cutting their amount of time worked.  Today, we look at one reason why women’s employment rebounded from the depths of the Covid Recession so quickly – self-employment.

North Carolina's seasonally adjusted unemployment rate decreased from January’s revised rate of 3.9 percent.