Economic Barriers to Child Care

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The current child care system in the United States places most of the burden of paying for care on individual families. The rising costs of child care leaves many left without access to affordable, high-quality early childhood programs. Parents must often choose whether to work or forego a job due to unaffordable child care cost.  This webinar will describe a study that uses the REMI model to measure the economic impact of child care inaccessibility in Washington State.

The study examines the effect that child care availability has on labor force participation and productivity and its impact on the economy.  The results of the economic impact analysis show that Washington’s households, businesses, and economy experience major economic and fiscal losses due to child care inaccessibility. Findings indicate that the direct, indirect, and induced effects of short- and long-term disruptions derived from child care breakdowns translate not only into parents having less disposable income and companies being less productive, but also into lost government tax revenue, and statewide production.

Speaker

Dominic Modicamore, MUP
Labor Economics Lead at ICF

Dominic Modicamore is an Economist with 26 years of professional experience. He is a subject matter expert in economic and fiscal impact analysis, labor market analytics, and industry sector analysis. He also has extensive experience measuring program performance by analyzing participant outcomes and conducting cost, ROI, and cost-benefit analysis studies. Mr. Modicamore has conducted numerous economic and fiscal impact analysis, ROI studies, labor market, industry sector, and economic development studies at the national, regional, and local levels. Recent economic impact studies that Mr. Modicamore has completed include the economic and fiscal impact of the Washington DC food industry cluster, the economic and fiscal impact of child care accessibility in Washington State, the economic and fiscal impact of refugee resettlement in Colorado, and the economic impact of oil and gas industry in the Gulf Coast.  Mr. Modicamore has a Master of Urban Planning (M.U.P.) degree with a specialization in Economic Development Planning from the State University of New York at Buffalo.

ChatGPT for Economic Analysis

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Join us for a webinar as we integrate OpenAI’s ChatGPT with REMI model outputs to interpret results and draft a summary report. We will start by introducing the REMI economic modeling framework and discuss how it can help organizations make informed decisions on a range of economic issues. We will then explore the challenges that analysts face when interpreting and analyzing the results of these models, and how ChatGPT can provide insights to help navigate these challenges. 

This webinar is ideal for professionals in the fields of economics, public policy, and data analysis who want to learn how to unlock the potential of ChatGPT for economic analysis. Our expert presenters will demonstrate how ChatGPT can help users describe key results from REMI models, identify challenges and generate supporting narratives. 

Prospects for Growth and Change: U.S. Metropolitan Areas

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The U.S. faces economic uncertainty at the global, national, state and local level. Private and government decision makers still need long-term economic forecasts to inform their planning and policies. Frederick Treyz, PhD, will present “Prospects for Growth and Change: U.S. Metro Area Forecasts 2022-2032,” published in the Economic Development Quarterly, February 2023.

In this webinar, Frederick Treyz will present REMI’s baseline economic and demographic forecasts for major U.S. metropolitan areas for the next 10 years. He will describe the methodology underlying these projections, and the reasons for differences in population and GDP growth estimates.  The REMI model provides a framework for forecasting and policy analysis; Mr. Treyzwill show how model users can adjust the forecast to account for regional expertise in future economic conditions.

Navigating Federal Regulation: How Policies Impact Regional Businesses

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In today’s fast-paced and complex business environment, government regulations play a critical role in shaping your regional landscape. In this webinar, we explored the impact of government regulation on businesses of all sizes and types. We’ll delve into the different types of regulation, with a particular focus on recent EPA regulations regarding emissions and water quality. 

Using REMI E3+, we demonstrated how public and private stakeholders can analyze increases in cost of production due to government regulation, as well as the environmental impacts. Presenter Jeffrey Dykes also provided commentary on why this type of analysis is crucial for the long-term health of utilities and private businesses. 

Mental Health and the Wealth of Regions

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Region 1 Planning Council presented on the relationship between mental health and workforce productivity, highlighting recent research on the subject, and modeling the potential impacts of reduced workforce productivity due to increased mental health issues stemming from the COVID-19 pandemic. They also explored the potential economic impacts of mitigating a percentage of productivity losses through increasing access to mental health services.

Speakers:

Jason Holcomb
Director of Community Impact at Region 1 Planning Council

Jason is a 40 under 40 leader, with a tenacious passion for mental health. Having worked many years in the community mental health and disability sector, Jason sees mental health as foundational to the success of a community. He has been trained in multiple collaborative approaches and brings a collaborative innovation lens to funding, project development, and community building. Currently, Jason serves as Director of Community Impact for Region 1 Planning Council and through intergovernmental agreement, manages the day to day operations of the Winnebago County Community Mental Health Board (WCCMHB), allocating funding from the 1/2 cent sales tax for mental health in Winnebago County.  He has a master’s degree in social work (MSW) focused in leadership from Indiana University School of Social Work.

Rashaad Pierre
Data Analyst at Region 1 Planning Council

Rashaad Pierre is a 2021 graduate from Northern Illinois University with a B.S. in Applied Mathematics and a minor in Statistics. After several jobs in the service industry, Rashaad is excited to apply his education in the public sector as a Data Analyst at Region 1 Planning Council (R1). Rashaad had focused on many different topics during his undergrad such as model building, proof writing, statistics and performing calculations. Rashaad is new to the field of data Analytics but he is excited to build his project portfolio at R1.