Jim Stergios of Pioneer Institute, a Boston based think tank, recently met with some South Shore Chamber leaders about Pioneer's report on the changing look of businesses in Massachusetts and the discouraging implications for job growth.
We have a net loss of companies that are headquartered here, national/international companies with local offices have reduced the number of jobs in those offices, and the rise in new businesses is with self-employed entrepreneurs who may not even plan on adding employees. The challenge facing the state is doing more to cultivate home-grown growth of local businesses.
The South Shore though is positioned to set a different trend. The extraordinary growth in housing planned for this area means we have the potential to draw more of the entrepreneurs who will be starting their own businesses and more of the workforce that larger employers need. For companies that need to have a solid workforce this could make business re-location or expansion to the South Shore more attractive. We won't change the state trends but to use a tired analogy the South Shore could stand to significantly grow its piece of what amounts to a shrinking state pie.
Our challenge is to attract those people, readily accepting new business growth and working to create a vibrant regional economy that helps business growth. This makes the Chamber's work more important than ever as we begin to see the development that is taking off on the South Shore.
You can the op-ed piece that Jim and I wrote for the Patriot Ledger at
You can read the Pioneer report at
http://www.pioneerinstitute.org/pdf/110531_TheBigShrink.pdf
-Peter Forman, President & CEO
