Has Work Grown More Transactional? It’s Complicated.
What is commonly referred to as “loyalty” between employers and employees has eroded for decades. Does the weakening of implied contracts mean that work has become more transactional?
Kenan Insights
Kenan Insights, institute-affiliated thought leaders translate recent academic research findings into actionable takeaways for business and policy. To speak with one of our experts, please contact External Affairs Assistant Director Rob Knapp.
How Access Helps Define Wealth Inequality
As we prepare for the Conference on Market-Based Solutions for Reducing Wealth Inequality, an emphasis on access (and the lack thereof) provides a constructive framing of inequality’s principal factor.
Housing Affordability in North Carolina
The Kenan Institute has developed a housing affordability index for North Carolina counties. The index and accompanying interactive map allow users to compare current county-level affordability metrics and see how these measures have changed over time.
Renegotiating Work: Balancing Workplace Demands in Uncertain Times
Our 2026 Grand Challenge will investigate the changing nature of the mutual commitment that once anchored work. Discover the three key questions we’ll use to guide this year-long exploration.
Understanding the Importance of County-Level GDP
Forecasting gross domestic product is a challenging practice, but because GDP can reveal so much about the growth of a local economy, forecasts are an important guide in making policy and business decisions.
Why Values-Based Leadership Matters for Early-Career Success
Officials at North Carolina State University’s Shelton Leadership Center offer thoughts on how close the leadership gap by better preparing young employees to lead themselves, others and their organizations.
From Access to Alignment: NC Community Colleges Evolve To Serve Today’s Learners
Recent Kenan Institute research based on interviews across the state highlights the successes and remaining barriers that North Carolina community colleges face in recruiting and retaining students as the labor market continues to evolve.
Scaling Apprenticeships: Activating the Talent Poised To Fuel North Carolina’s Future
North Carolina’s growing skills gap reflects a national challenge, but the state’s robust job market is creating high-paying opportunities for skilled workers. We talked to four experts about how to successfully scale the state’s apprenticeship and training efforts.
Getting Quick, Flexible Funding to Community Anchor Institutions Recovering from Disasters
Public education and small business anchor institutions recover slowly after disasters, as observed in Western North Carolina’s continuing recovery from Hurricane Helene. One organization offers a lesson on the benefits of getting funding to these sectors faster.
NC’s Phosphate, Quartz (Silicon), and Lithium Resources in Clean Energy
We estimate that industries producing in-demand minerals could generate hundreds of millions of dollars in additional tax revenue for North Carolina and its communities by the end of the decade.
Cross-Sector Partnership as a Solution to the Skills Gap
The literature on cross-sector collaboration and cross-sector partnership has grown within disciplinary silos, but new literature reflects a growing recognition that siloed efforts no longer match the scale of workforce challenges such as the skills gap.
Rethinking Economic Distress: Why NC’s County Tiers System Is Due for an Overhaul
North Carolina adopted its County Tiers System to direct economic support toward struggling counties. An examination shows the nearly 40-year-old system is increasingly misaligned with both economic reality and stakeholder needs.
The Listening Crisis: How Extractive Habits Are Reshaping Communication
In an age of constant information overload, Professor Melissa Geil explores why deep listening is vanishing from the workplace and how that’s quietly undermining communication, trust and innovation.
Fueling Local Economies: How Business Formation Drives Growth in North Carolina
New business formation fuels local growth in North Carolina and offers real-time data to guide policy and forecasting, according to new research from the Kenan Institute, the North Carolina Collaboratory, and the Secretary of State.
Manufacturing: Regional Strengths and Shifts (Redux)
We update an August 2023 piece in which we explain why manufacturing remains essential for economic growth and how manufacturing in the US today incorporates both regional shifts and “stickiness” in traditional strongholds.
Artificial Intelligence and the Skills Gap
The AI transformation has yet to happen, prompting uncertainty about potential impacts on the skills gap and the nature of work. Recognizing this will help us develop strategies for mitigating potential risks to workers, firms and the economy.
Grand Challenge 2025: The Skills Gap
Our 2025 Grand Challenge examines the skills gap — the difference between the skills that employers seek and those that workers possess — which is being driven by technological breakthroughs, demographic changes and cultural shifts in the workplace.
The Home Insurance Crisis Comes to North Carolina: Rising Costs, Heightened Risk and a Changing Climate
The destruction that Hurricane Helene brought to Western North Carolina in September, followed by this month’s wildfires in Southern California, illustrates the financial risk that increasingly unpredictable weather can pose to homeowners and the insurance system.
Constructing an Expansive Understanding of Inequality
What do we mean when we talk about “inequality”? There are numerous ways to measure it, each method with its relative strengths and weaknesses, and we must be clear what we mean when assessing inequality for policymaking.
Operational Resilience in the Post-Pandemic World
2024 Distinguished Fellow Jayashankar M. Swaminathan explores how firms can build operational resilience, focusing on governance, risk management, supply chains, technology and regulatory compliance.
Navigating Marketplace Threats: An Analysis of Resilience Strategies from The CMO Survey
Distinguished Fellow Christine Moorman leverages data from The CMO Survey to uncover the view of marketplace threats and resilience strategies from the perspective of actual managers as part of our 2024 Grand Challenge.
How Cities Get Top Talent: Predictors of Migration in the US
To attract skilled talent in an evolving economic landscape, public and private sector leaders must understand the factors – economic, social and political conditions – that push and pull people and drive relocation.
Lessons on Small Business Resilience from the Global Pandemic
More than four years since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, we examine the essential elements that build small-business resilience, emphasizing the importance of personal fortitude and intangible resources in ensuring business survival.
Productivity Driving Prosperity: Decoding Local Economic Growth
To find signs of productivity, we must first know where to look. Chief Economist Gerald Cohen describes how an area’s industry mix is key to its productivity and how adjusting that mix can drive more local growth using data from our American Growth Project.