There’s a new benchmark to assess how well North Carolina is faring economically. The state Commerce Department launched the County Economic Vitality Index in February, tracking unemployment, wages, median household income and educational attainment. One of the big takeaways is suburbs may be on the rise. Ashley Fahey of the Charlotte Ledger Business Newsletter joined WFAE’s Marshall Terry for our segment BizWorthy.
Marshall Terry: We’ll get to the suburbs part in a moment. First, what does the index say about Mecklenburg County?
Ashley Fahey: Between 2010 and 2024, which is the most recent year in which all the data is available, Mecklenburg has unsurprisingly been on pretty much an upward growth trajectory. It ranked fourth across all 100 North Carolina counties in 2024, considering all four metrics.
Terry: Why does the index point to good things for suburbs — and how are suburbs defined?
Fahey: I found it really fascinating that all of the Charlotte area suburban counties in North Carolina, they all shot up. Even some of the lower-performing counties like Rowan and Gaston, which have been lagging the national benchmark before 2020, they all saw this big increase. I think that just speaks to what we kind of talk about a lot, which is a lot of folks moved to the suburbs during the pandemic, looking for housing affordability. Some jobs and other things have kind of moved outside of Mecklenburg. When we talk about the suburbs in this context, we're really talking about the metro area outside of Mecklenburg proper. Union actually outranked Mecklenburg in the most recent scoring from 2024. Union County has been on quite a growth tear, especially, I would say, since the pandemic. I think it just shows how much more of an economic powerhouse suburban counties are becoming.
Terry: It’s been a week now since Los Angeles-headquartered Capital Group announced it’s establishing an operations hub in Charlotte and bringing 600 high-paying jobs. Do we know what kinds of jobs and just where this hub will be located?
Fahey: I did ask the company right in the immediate aftermath of the announcement what kinds of jobs are coming to Charlotte. They were a little vague. It basically said it would include key operational roles as well as positions in legal and compliance, technology, data. The city indicated that data and artificial intelligence engineering, data science, a lot of these types of positions we've actually been seeing from some of the financial services companies that have long been established here and the ones that are coming. We don't know exactly where they're landing. There's been some rumors about what buildings they're looking at, but they are definitely going to be in uptown.
Terry: Speaking of uptown, it appears Wake Forest’s business school is relocating from there. Where to, and what's behind that decision?
Fahey: They've been in this building that has really emptied out in the last few years since the pandemic. Bank of America had been the anchor tenant there, but now the business school is kind of the last tenant standing in that building. So they're going to relocate in the coming months to The Pearl in Midtown, which is very close to uptown. It sounds like to me it's a consolidation of the operations they already have at The Pearl. Of course, we know that the med school by Wake Forest and Atrium is there. You see a lot of companies kind of looking, especially post-pandemic, to consolidate their offices. That will effectively leave this building they’re departing in uptown empty, and I think it's going to be interesting to see what happens next.
Terry: Let’s end on some medical business news. Starting next year in Charlotte, some residents will be able to get their prescriptions sent to their homes. But not by traditional mail, right?
Fahey: Exactly. Atrium is the latest to kind of get in on the drone delivery game. They plan to start delivering prescriptions, labs, and medical supplies across Charlotte starting in 2027. This drone network will be operated by a separate drone company called Zipline. I guess be on the lookout for that starting next year.
Support for BizWorthy comes from the law office of Robertson & Associates.
