Policy-makers turned lecturers in seminars
By Todd Feathers | The Huntington News | September 20, 2012
Of the hundreds of classes held at Northeastern each semester, only one attracts nationally renowned professors, economists, politicians and chief executives on a weekly basis.
Held in the basement of West Village F every Wednesday night, this semester’s open classroom series, entitled Policy Advice to the President, has a schedule of speakers that include Michael Dukakis, former Democratic nominee for president and professor of political science at Northeastern; Greg Mankiw, economic policy adviser to Mitt Romney; Nicholas Burns, former undersecretary of state for political affairs and many more.
The open classroom, designed as a graduate-level class in the school of Public Policy and Urban affairs, is unusual in two ways: It’s open to anyone who wants to attend, and it’s free.
“I really think the university should use its resources, the facilities and the people to benefit the community,” Barry Bluestone, Dean of the School of Public Policy and Urban Affairs and co-moderator of the class, said.
The open classroom series began in 2008 when Bluestone began teaching a graduate course that attracted so few students he decided to open it to the public. The topic changes every year, and the attendance has been steadily growing.
“It’s gotten to the point, and we’ve received such popularity, that we can really attract some star speakers,” Bluestone said. Attendance has jumped from around 30 people the first year to nearly 150 last year, he said.
“I’ve been to every session so far,” Grace Healey, 69, who has no affiliation to the university, said. “I drive 25 miles to get here. I’m just interested in the issues that are being discussed. Certainly Larry Summers [former U.S. secretary of the treasury] and Glen Mankiw [Romney’s economic adviser] were very impressive. The subject matter is what you come for.”
This year’s session focuses on economic, foreign and social policy advice for whoever the next president is.
“We are at a critical juncture right now in our country,” Setti Warren, Mayor of Newton and co-moderator of the class, said. “The discussions that are being had in this election will have an impact here and around the country.”
Bluestone said he and the other moderators tried to assemble a group of speakers that would present a wide variety of opinions on a range of different issues.
“We have a spectrum of views because we want our students to understand a wide variety of opinions,” Bluestone said. “The major theme is to try and explore a variety of public policy options that the president, whoever he may be in November, could pursue.”
The wide assortment of different opinions is also reflected in the class’ audience, who spend the second half of the two hour class questioning the speakers and each other.
“More often than not it’s more of the middle-aged group who ask the questions,” Jeff Newton, a sophomore philosophy major, said. “But last week there was a high school student who asked a pretty good question about health care and a bunch of students speak out too.”
Bluestone said in the 40 years he has been teaching, he’s never enjoyed a class more than the open classroom series, primarily because of the mix of students it attracts.
“We have people as guest students who work for the mayor, work for businesses and we also have people who come from the public housing homes down the street,” he said.
Manufacturing Has a Healthy Future in Massachusetts as sector Stabilizes and Sees Growth
MFR Tech | September 16, 2012
“Manufacturing is alive and well in Massachusetts, and has a healthy future,” Professor Barry Bluestone of Northeastern University told more than 200 industry and policy leaders, including Gov. Deval Patrick and Lt. Gov. Timothy Murray, as he unveiled a new report, Staying Power II: A Report Card on Manufacturing in Massachusetts. The findings of the report were detailed Thursday morning at an event at precision manufacturer AccuRounds in Avon.
Bluestone heads Northeastern’s Dukakis Center for Urban and Regional Policy, which produced the report with support from The Greater Boston Manufacturing Partnership (GBMP), the Mass Tech Collaborative, RBS Citizens and The Boston Foundation.
The study is based on a survey of 700 companies across the state and updates an earlier version that used data gathered before the economy fell into recession. Massachusetts manufacturing, Bluestone noted, “ïf anything, appears to be in a better position today than in 2007 to prosper in the future.”
Jobs losses in manufacturing stabilized over the past three years, according to the report, and even though the economic sector is expected to continue shrinking through 2016 public officials remain optimistic about the potential for growth in high tech manufacturing fields.
Some Key Findings About Massachusetts Manufacturing
- Despite its image as a vanishing segment of the state’s economy, manufacturing remains the sixth largest industry employer in Massachusetts, ahead of financial services, wholesale trade, construction, state government, and information services.
- The average annual pay of a manufacturing worker is about $75,000. In terms of payroll for employees, manufacturing is the second largest industry in the state, after health care.
- 65% of the 700 manufacturers surveyed expect to increase production over the next five years;
- The number of manufacturing firms in Massachusetts increased in 2011 by 43 for the first time in decades;
- Most Massachusetts manufacturing companies are small (72% have fewer than 20 employees), and most (again, 72%) are family-owned;
- Although most jobs in manufacturing are now “white collar,” only about one position in five requires a college degree
- Although manufacturers may consider leaving Massachusetts because of cost issues, the survey found that the skills and work ethic of the state’s workforce are powerful reasons to stay.
- The overall productivity at the state’s 7,500 manufacturing companies has increased at an 8.7% annualized clip over the past five years, far faster than in other sectors in Massachusetts. The report attributes the gains to investments by companies in manufacturing robotics, machinery and equipment, and in training employees.
- Even though manufacturing accounts for 8 percent of employment, it is responsible for more than 12% of the state’s economic output. Last year, the value of manufactured products rose to 12.2% of total goods and services produced in the state, up from 10.8% in 2009;
- Massachusetts manufacturers shed 50,000 jobs during the recent economic downturn, but the rate of decline was much smaller than in past recessions. Employment stabilized after 2009 at about 250,000 jobs;
- As many as 100,000 manufacturing jobs could open for younger workers over the next several years as baby boomers retire;
Looking ahead, Bluestone reported, 65% of manufacturing firms expect to see higher production levels in Massachusetts in five years, and 70% forsee expansion of employment in the state. These very encouraging results can be realized, he said, only by facing up to the recruitment challenge by working proactively with educational institutions and training organizations, and promoting manufacturing careers. Employers are already experiencing difficulty in hiring skilled workers, and an upcoming wave of retirements will create up to 100,000 job vacancies over the next 10 years.
This, he suggested, falls within the purview of the new Massachusetts Advanced Manufacturing Collaborative, an industry-led group from manufacturing, academia and government, with the mission to promote manufacturing, workforce training and education, technical assistance and innovation, access to capital, and controlling the costs of doing business.
“We’re happy to see that Professor Bluestone has done the analysis and confirmed what the governor and I have been seeing around the state that our manufacturers have done a great job of reinventing themselves in Massachusetts,” Secretary of Economic Development Greg Bialecki says.
Governor Deval Patrick agreed, saying, “Professor Bluestone has given us a great story to tell, and we have to tell it – together.”
However, despite all this positive news, several “clouds” hang over the sector, including health insurance and energy costs, and the ability to replace a rapidly aging workforce, though some say manufacturers should look more to community college graduates.
During the event, Patrick announced a new initiative to promote manufacturing that includes $5 million in state funding to improve workforce competitiveness and create workshops to promote awareness of capital and technical assistance for companies. Murray also launched “AMP It Up,” a new statewide careers promotional campaign to increase awareness among young people about job opportunities within the industry.
Michael Tamasi, President of AccuRounds, says AccuRounds competes internationally, and wins. He says the company has doubled employment and tripled revenue over the past ten years, despite the recent recession. Tamasi is planning to almost double the size of his manufacturing plant, add equipment and floor space, and he’s hiring machinists.
“This report shows that, if you’re good at what you do and you do it efficiently, you can compete globally,” said Tamasi, who also serves as chairman of the Greater Boston Manufacturing Partnership, a co-sponsor of the Northeastern report.
Obama and Romney economic advisers spar on taxes, US aid
Harvard economists offer rival visions
By Megan Woolhouse | The Boston Globe | September 14, 2012
In a Northeastern University classroom, the architect of President Obama’s stimulus plan and a key economic adviser to presidential candidate Mitt Romney laid out competing visions on how to repair the nation’s economy — the issue that has come to define the election campaign.
Lawrence Summers, a former Harvard University president, Treasury secretary under President Bill Clinton, and top economic adviser to Obama, told the audience government must help fuel a recovery, advocating for additional stimulus to repair schools, hire teachers, and rebuild airports.
On the other end sat N. Gregory Mankiw, who in addition to counseling Romney served as chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers under President George W. Bush. He said the key to a long-term recovery is tax reform, including a review of the necessity of popular tax breaks, such as the deduction for mortgage interest.
The Wednesday night forum, called Open Classroom, was part of a series of lectures on election-year issues. Open to the public, this week’s class offered a glimpse into the economic thinking that has helped shape the candidates’ very different policies.
The joint appearance of Summers and Mankiw, both Harvard professors, came less than week after a disappointing employment report showed slow job growth in August and a US unemployment rate holding above 8 percent.
The Federal Reserve, citing its concern over continued high unemployment, on Thursday said it would inject more stimulus into the economy by pushing down long-term interest rates and holding its key short-term interest rate near zero through mid-2015.
Summers and Mankiw did not address the central bank and its policies but focused on measures available to the White House and Congress. They aired competing views about stimulus spending, taxes, and the deficit.
Summers cited the need for a combination of targeted tax cuts and government spending to fuel a recovery when the private sector is “unwilling or unable” to do it.
“How many of you have been to Kennedy Airport? How many of you are proud of Kennedy Airport?” Summers asked. “Government [could be] borrowing money in a currency we print at a time when interest rates are below 3 percent and unemployment in the construction sector is high. Could there be a better time to fix Kennedy Airport?”
Summers said offering a tax break for middle-class Americans would be better for the economy than a tax break that benefits the wealthiest, because middle-class families tend to spend extra money quickly, putting it back into the economy, while those earning $250,000 or more a year tend to save it.
And he speculated Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, who attended Harvard, would probably accept a tax increase.
“I suspect Greg Mankiw will disagree with me on that point,” he added.
Mankiw, who described Summers as a mentor while he was a graduate student at MIT, said the question of whether the richest should pay more is a “political question and a question of values” about the role of government. Like other conservative economists, he said he was more concerned about the long-term outlook and unchecked government borrowing that could lead to crippling debt. “Borrowing without repaying, that’s when we become like Greece,” he said.
Greece, with unemployment above 20 percent, is struggling under crushing debt and has teetered on the brink of default, threatening the stability of the euro currency.
Mankiw offered no new insights into Romney’s proposal to lower tax rates while eliminating various breaks or “loopholes.” Romney has been criticized for being short on specifics about which breaks would be scrapped and how the plan would avoid adding to the nation’s debt or increasing taxes for the middle class.
Mankiw, who teaches one of the most popular courses at Harvard, questioned whether the sick economy needs another dose of big-government stimulus when the medicine failed to significantly lower the unemployment rate.
“There’s no easy answer” to that question, Mankiw said. “But I think if a Republican was in charge [at the White House], we would have seen more attention to tax policy.”
Mankiw, describing his views as his own and not those of the Romney campaign, said he thinks popular tax deductions should be reevaluated and eliminated or streamlined. Describing the mortgage interest deduction, for example, he questioned why renters, who are typically poorer than homeowners, should subsidize homeowners.
“I like it personally,” he said of the mortgage interest deduction, “but it fails the test of efficiency.”
Manufacturing poised for promising future, Northeastern University study says
By Jay Fitzgerald | Boston.com | September 13, 2012
After decades of losing factory and assembly line jobs, manufacturing is poised for a promising future in Massachusetts, thanks to corporate investments in cutting-edge technologies and skilled workers who are churning out high-end products faster and cheaper than ever here, a new study says.
Employment in the sector has stabilized since the last recession and production is at its highest level in a decade, according to the study from Northeastern University released Thursday. Overall, manufacturing employment in the state is still expected to decrease, largely due to automation and increased productivity, but the declines will be nowhere near as steep as over the past 20 years.
Even so, some companies within “advanced manufacturing,” the segment of the industry that makes highly sophisticated products for the aerospace, computer, chemical, pharmaceutical, and other sectors, could expand payrolls and global market shares, the report said.
Some firms may even bring manufacturing jobs previously outsourced to other countries back to Massachusetts as customers demand higher quality work they can’t get elsewhere, the report said.
“Manufacturing in Massachusetts has survived the Great Recession and, if anything, appears to be in a better position today than in 2007 to prosper in the future,” the authors wrote in the report, called “Staying Power II: A Report Card on Manufacturing in Massachusetts 2012.”
Key findings of the report include:
– The overall productivity at the state’s 7,500 manufacturing companies has increased at an 8.7 percent annualized clip over the past five years, far faster than in other sectors in Massachusetts. The report attributes the gains to investments by companies in manufacturing robotics, machinery and equipment, and in training employees.
– Even though manufacturing accounts for 8 percent of employment, it is responsible for more than 12 percent of the state’s economic output. Last year, the value of manufactured products rose to 12.2 percent of total goods and services produced in the state, up from 10. 8 percent in 2009.
– Massachusetts manufacturers shed 50,000 jobs during the recent economic downturn, but the rate of decline was much smaller than in past recessions. Employment stabilized after 2009 at about 250,000 jobs.
– As many as 100,000 manufacturing jobs could open for younger workers over the next several years as baby boomers retire.
– Despite its image as a vanishing segment of the state’s economy, manufacturing remains the sixth largest industry employer in Massachusetts, ahead of financial services, wholesale trade, construction, state government, and information services.
— The average annual pay of a manufacturing worker is about $75,000. In terms of payroll for employees, manufacturing is the second largest industry in the state, after health care.
Barry Bluestone, the lead researcher on the study and director of the Dukakis Center for Urban and Regional Studies at Northeastern, said he wasn’t expecting to find manufacturing in such good shape, considering its historical downward trend and the severity of the recent recession.
“I’m incredibly encouraged and surprised,” said Bluestone. “Manufacturing has performed pretty darn well over the past few years.”
Michael Tamasi, chief executive of AccuRounds Inc., a precision manufacturer in Avon, said he hopes the public – and young workers and policymakers – realize that manufacturing has a future in Massachusetts. The report was to be formally unveiled at AccuRounds Thursday.
“This report shows that, if you’re good at what you do and you do it efficiently, you can compete globally,” said Tamasi, who also serves as chairman of the Greater Boston Manufacturing Partnership, a co-sponsor of the Northeastern report.
Tamasi noted that AccuRounds’ revenues have tripled to $11 million and its workforce has doubled to 71 over the past 10 years, due to increased business, some from European and US firms that previously outsourced work to other countries. “They realize we can do it better,” said Tamasi.
Michael Goodman, chairman of the Department of Public Policy at the University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth, said he’s encouraged by the report’s findings, which he said are consistent with manufacturing trends across the country..
“Even though some people say, ‘We don’t make things anymore in this country,’ that’s simply not accurate,” said Goodman. “We just produce goods with fewer people today. This is a story about technological advancement and having more skilled workers.”
But he cautioned that Bay State manufacturing won’t prosper if future workers aren’t trained well and early enough. “Our workforce-development and education sectors have their work cut out for them.”
Natick evaluates its economic strengths and weaknesses
By Brian Benson | The MetroWest Daily News | August 7, 2012
Town leaders Monday began reviewing results of an economic development self-assessment, rating the town on dozens of factors from transportation to access to the development permitting process.
Town and business leaders met in June to respond to questions posed by the study, which was funded by the MetroWest Chamber of Commerce and done through Northeastern University’s Dukakis Center for Urban and Regional Policy.
“This process is invaluable,” selectmen Chairman Paul Joseph, who leads the town’s Economic Development Committee. “The conversations (between the town and businesses) this has stimulated and will continue to stimulate is most important.”
The committee on Monday reviewed some of the preliminary results of the study, which compared Natick to other communities.
The study indicates the town had a lower percentage of available sites near a limited-access highway but more near public transportation than other towns. Natick scored above average for having commuter rail in town and several colleges nearby.
Natick was on par with other communities in enforcement of codes and maintaining streets and sidewalks near development sites, but it takes longer in Natick to complete site plan and zoning variance reviews, the study found.
Community Development Director Patrick Reffett said the town is working on improving zoning bylaws and has an intern developing a guide to permitting for prospective businesses.
Committee member Scott Laughlin said he would like to see a comparison with Wellesley or Newton.
Joseph said he hopes to learn more about the communities to which Natick is being compared. The town will have discussions with Northeastern researchers about the results and the study’s methodology, he said.
Joseph said that, for example, “available sites” only looks at vacant properties. Evaluating the proximity of all sites to highways may present a different picture, he said.
The survey, though, helps town leaders identify areas to focus their efforts, Joseph said.
“Economic development in 2012 is a sales process,” he said. “We are competing. We can’t rest on our laurels.”
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