Regional Matters

Investment by community development financial institutions (CDFIs) varies by county and between urban and rural areas. Are these variations driven by differences between urban and rural CDFIs in the U.S. and the Fifth District?

A special survey on hiring and wages, conducted in November, showed that a majority of Fifth District firms expect to hire or hold payrolls steady and plan to use wage increases to attract and retain workers over the next twelve months.

Young adults are buying houses at lower rates than in previous generations. In the Fifth District, the gap between young and older adult homeownership rates is particularly high in rural counties. What is behind this trend?

The Richmond Fed conducts monthly surveys of business conditions. The information collected are aggregated and combined into several individual diffusion indices. But what kind of information do diffusion indices reveal?

Since 2005, 155 hospitals in rural America have closed. Eighteen of those closures were in the Fifth Federal Reserve District. Why do we see hospitals in rural areas closing at a higher rate than at any time since the mid-1980s?

Mortgages make up the majority of debt across the United States and in the Fifth District. However, the share of mortgage debt has recently fallen while student loan debt has become a larger share. Meanwhile, delinquencies for auto loans have increased in the last couple of years.

Uneven access to or use of broadband results in a digital divide. But how serious is the digital divide across the country and in the Fifth District? It depends on who you ask.

Although firms in the Fifth District received approximately $129 billion in contracts from the federal government in fiscal year 2018, some of those contracts span several years or were subcontracted out. How much did firms receive after adjusting for those factors? 

The labor force participation rate varies considerably across Fifth District jurisdictions, from West Virginia's 53.3 percent to the District of Columbia's 70.4 percent. What is driving the differences among jurisdictions? 

Recently revised payroll employment data for 2018 showed that fewer jobs were added in the Fifth District than originally reported. The largest downward revisions occurred with data for North Carolina, West Virginia, and Virginia.