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Northern Virginia’s job engine is boosting employment numbers not only in its own region, but in Greater Richmond and Hampton Roads, too. That’s a key insight provided by Chmura Economics & Analytics after chewing on data from the Virginia Employment Commission. The information provides a new starting point for considering everything from transportation connections to Chesapeake Bay environmental questions as Virginia’s Urban Crescent muscles up.
First, some facts. In its most recent quarterly "Virginia Economic Trends," Chmura reports that Virginia added over 80,636 jobs in the 12 months ending in March 2006.
Of those, 45,659, or 57 percent, were created in Northern Virginia during that period. But Chmura also documents an accelerating trend of business branches and jobs created elsewhere in Virginia by firms, particularly technology firms, based in Northern Virginia. Northern Virginia is creating not only jobs for itself, but as many as 20 percent of the new jobs in the rest of Virginia, too.
Chmura starts by breaking recent business expansion history down into five-year periods. For the five years ending in 1995, the report notes, Northern Virginia firms created 17,191 new jobs in other areas of the state. That’s an average of 3,400 jobs a year downstate. For the five years ending in 2000, Northern Virginia firms created 28,560 jobs in other areas of the state, an average of 5,700 jobs a year. And for the five years ending in 2005, Northern Virginia firms created 36,191 jobs in other parts of the state. That’s an average of 7,200 jobs a year, double the rate of the early 1990s.
Increasingly, Chmura also suggests, those jobs created by Northern Virginia
firms in other parts of Virginia are related to the tech boom that continues in Northern Virginia. From 1990 to 1995, for example, 32 percent of the downstate jobs created by Northern Virginia firms were technology jobs. By 2000 to 2005, 41 percent of the downstate jobs created by Northern Virginia firms were technology jobs.
And which regions now benefit the most from new technology business branches of companies whose main branches are in Northern Virginia? Chmura shows the Hampton Roads region is the clear winner. Norfolk with 97 firm expansions from 2000 to 2005, Virginia Beach (74 firm expansions) and Hampton (57 expansions) are 1,2,3 on the top ten list. Chesapeake (36) is 5th and Newport News (29) is 7th.
Greater Richmond does pretty well as a branch location for Northern Virginia firms. Henrico County (45 firm expansions) is 4th, Chesterfield County (29 expansion) is 7th and Richmond (28) is 9th on the top ten list.
Then jurisdictions closer to Northern Virginia, King George County (30 firm expansions) and Stafford County (27), round out the top
ten.
A step beyond these economic insights are the public sector investment challenges that come with such positive trends. Lots more transportation capacity turns out not only to be critical to the Northern Virginia jobs engine, but also to the Northern Virginia jobs engine working directly in Hampton Roads and Greater Richmond. More attention to the Chesapeake Bay becomes not only important to the Bay, itself, but to a sustainable quality of life for perhaps a million more residents who may live in Virginia’s Urban Crescent by 2025. The best tech jobs and a high quality of life go hand in hand.
Transportation and communication infrastructures become even more important when firms accelerate the distribution of jobs across the state. So, Virginians should ask their regional and state leaders why they continue to spin their wheels on transportation investments. More specifically, ask leaders what they are committed to doing now (and in a special legislative session to be held this
fall on transportation) to meet a challenge such as freight volumes at the Port of Virginia
doubling in the next 15 years.
Start by pointing out that 12 of the biggest truck bottlenecks in the United States already occur in Virginia, according to the Federal Highway Administration, at a cost of
three million hours of delay and $100 million in economic losses annually.
Consider as a second question how to meet a similar challenge of passenger and truck traffic doubling at Dulles Airport in that time if we don’t start moving now. This is the political challenge for Virginia’s regional and state leaders: Get together to support the great market-driven jobs creation and distribution trends Chmura Economics &
Analytics documents. Tackling what’s necessary to meet the challenge should be a no-brainer. Who wouldn’t want to keep such positive trends going?
Even the key players line up properly. Virginia’s governor, lieutenant governor and attorney general are from the Crescent. So were their predecessors. Two-thirds of the General Assembly represent jurisdictions in the Crescent, including eight of the ten delegates and senators who served recently as budget conferees and the Speaker of the House. More partisanship, ideology and social wedge issues from these office-holders is just a dead end. Emulating Northern Virginia business executives in connecting jobs and the economy across Virginia is a far better course.
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July 11, 2006
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