Tag: economy

Today marks the start of the 2021 MN Legislative Session. A session that will likely be very different than any other legislative session since it will begin and likely remain an online affair. Our CEO, Julie Tesch got an opportunity to chat with Scott McMahon, the Executive Director of the Greater Minnesota Partnership about the ...

By Whitney Oachs, Research Intern As discussed in our recent 2020 State of Rural Report, most farmers were barely getting by before the onslaught of COVID-19. While agricultural land values have remained at historic highs, low commodity prices and increased costs of production have resulted in negative net income, contributing to declining mental health for ...

Our thanks go out to Tim Penny, president of the Southern Minnesota Initiative Foundation and former First District Congressman, for his opinion piece in last Sunday’s Minneapolis Star Tribune featuring our work on cost of living and how your dollar can go further in Greater Minnesota. The study itself is getting a lot of traction ...

Our report, “A brief discussion: Wages can go further in Greater Minnesota”, explored how wages throughout Greater Minnesota can compete with wages in the seven-county metro when taking into account the cost of living. On July 15, 2020, we hosted a webinar where this information was presented. We were joined by Rural Sociologist Ben Winchester ...

An economic and demographic update of rural Minnesota By Kelly Asche, Research Associate & Marnie Werner, Vice President, Research For a printable version of the report, click here. Each year, the Center for Rural Policy and Development provides a brief update on various economic and demographic data pertaining to rural Minnesota. As policy discussions concerning ...

Neela Mollgaard has spent the last twenty years helping entrepreneurs in Greater Minnesota get their business ideas off the ground, first with Red Wing Ignite and now with LaunchMN, a new effort from the state to foster high-tech startups. We talk about what worked with Red Wing Ignite and now what LaunchMN is doing with ...

  In the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic, with unemployment claims in Minnesota hovering at around 20% of the labor force, it might seem strange to talk about a workforce shortage. But just last winter (that seems so long ago, doesn’t it?) that’s exactly what we were talking about. As a follow-up to last year’s ...

    Last Friday (May 1, 2020), we convened a virtual gathering to discuss the rural response to COVID-19.  We decided to host this gathering because we were hearing from all corners of the state that the needs of rural Minnesota were not being heard in St. Paul.  Up until that point, most of the ...

We wanted to pass along this April 17 post from the MN Department of Employment and Economic Development’s blog. DEED is taking suggestions from business owners around the state on how they can operate safely during the pandemic.  As we continue careful planning for how to get more Minnesotans safely back to work, it’s been ...