Speaking of the Economy

Michael Newsome talks about what he has learned about apprenticeships from discussions with business and education leaders. As an illustration, Melissa Stowasser shares how Trident Technical College partnered with smaller employers to develop an apprenticeship program for the Charleston, S.C., region.

Erik Hurst discusses his research on the potential impacts of AI adoption on the labor market, in particular entry-level workers and their human capital development over time through the acquisition of new skills and knowledge.

Jay Langston discusses how rural communities in western Virginia have diversified the region from agriculture into pharmaceutical and other forms of manufacturing. Key ingredients of this economic progress include developing the local workforce, building relationships between local and state economic development organizations, and addressing quality-of-life issues. Langston is executive director of the Shenandoah Valley Partnership.

Daniel Davis talks about the barriers that rural communities face in fully realizing their economic potential and how economic development professionals have addressed those barriers. He also shares insights on this topic from the speakers at an Investing in Rural America webinar in June 2026.

John Bailey Jones and Jason Kosakow discuss their research on how family members and friends give their time and money to help each other and how these transfers benefit households.

John O'Trakoun discusses the supply shocks resulting from the recent conflicts in the Middle East and how businesses and consumers have responded to these shocks. O'Trakoun is a senior policy economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond.

Urvi Neelakantan describes how employment, income growth and consumption can differ between groups of households and reviews recent trends in this divergence of economic outcomes.

Surekha Carpenter and Borys Grochulski discuss how community development financial institutions work to help underserved communities that lack adequate access to credit and what factors determine their success in filling market gaps.

Marina Azzimonti discusses how digital currency like stablecoin and physical currency like the U.S. dollar are tied together, how the demand for one affects the other, and how this relationship plays out in global financial markets.

Sonya Waddell and John Graham share their research on the adoption of artificial intelligence in the workplace, based on the expected and realized effects reported by the financial executives who participate in the CFO Survey.