Bright lights, big cities: Metropolitan areas are where the state's economy shines brightest.

• Position: North Carolina; interview with economist Gary Shoesmith - Interview

In this special economic forecast, Gary Shoesmith, director of the Center for Economic and Banking Studies at Wake Forest University's Babcock Graduate School of Management, looks at the state's major urban areas. He focused on the state's 11 Metropolitan Statistical Areas. MSAs, defined by the U.S. Office of Management and Budget, offer a broader way of looking at cities using urban concentration and commuting patterns.

BNC: What strikes you about the MSA figures?

What's striking is the unemployment rate, in the Triangle in particular and also in the Triad and Charlotte. An unemployment rate of 3.3% is barely perceptible and amazingly low for any metropolitan area.

BNC: So what is going to happen with unemployment in 1995?

We're going to see unemployment in the Triad reach a 20-year low sometime in 1995, around 2.5%. And the Triangle will also see record-low unemployment rates of less than 2% sometime in 1995. And the same thing in the Charlotte area - I think we'll see unemployment rates dropping there also, although probably not reaching levels as low as in the early 1970s, which were right around 2%.

BNC: Is all the news positive?

Because of tightening in the local labor forces, wage rates are going to improve. The bad news is that these areas will find it increasingly difficult to continue attracting new businesses because of the shortage of labor and increasing costs per worker.

BNC: So is that going to help some of the smaller communities?

I think it's interesting to note here in North Carolina that, in what has been a very dispersed population, business areas are actually clustering more and more. And the clusters are in fact getting closer and closer.

BNC: What does that mean down the road?

If you extend this two or three more decades, and if planners across the state continue working to attract as many businesses as possible, then I think overall [TABULAR DATA OMITTED] that the quality of life could actually decline in North Carolina if we simply become another overpopulated area.

BNC: Like the Northeast?

Exactly. Where one town runs into another. I personally wouldn't like to see that. But I suspect many people would and are not the least concerned about it, one way or the other.

BNC: Is there a logical method of development that would prevent that?

If higher-skilled and higher-paying jobs are what we want to attract, and it seems like we would, then education becomes a key. In North Carolina, it's difficult to [TABULAR DATA...