Pockmarked positivity: the numbers point to faster economic growth for North Carolina this year, but companies will still have to clear obstacles such as health care.

What shape was the state's economy in at the start of 2014? How did it get there, and what does that mean for the rest of the year?

Keener: North Carolina is still climbing from the hole that the Great Recession put it in. The state lost 334,500 jobs during the economic downturn. The manufacturing and construction workforces took big hits. Since December 2007, which is about when the recession started, the state is still down 81,000 private jobs. An average of 6,200 jobs per month were added during the last 20 months, so it should take until early 2015 to reach prerecession levels. The professional- and business-services sectors added the most jobs in 2013--27,000. Trade and transportation added 18,000. Education and health services added 16,300. So we are increasing but not at the pace that everybody wants. The unemployment rate in November was 7.4%, and that's down from about a year ago. The state should see continued growth this year but at a quicker pace than in 2013.

Gray: This will be an interesting year. North Carolina should see about 100,000 jobs added. Most of them will be in Mecklenburg, Orange, Wake and Durham counties. Growth will continue along the Interstate 85 corridor but will be sluggish in the eastern part of the state. As a whole, North Carolina is still suffering through the transition from a manufacturing-based economy to a service-based one, though the Triangle and Charlotte regions are having an easier time. Unemployment will probably fall about 0.5% in 2014. In the Triangle and Charlotte regions it will probably fall to about 5%, which will be below statewide and national rates.

Daugherty: A promising indicator for this year is that small-business lending reached a six-year high in October 2013. Growth usually appears in the first or second quarter after those loans are made. Companies are tooling up and stocking inventories.

In 2013, the General Assembly passed several pieces of legislation, including tax reform, intended to help businesses and economic development. How will they affect the state's economy this year?

Moffitt: Policymaking is like farming: You hope you plant the right thing now so you have a robust harvest down the road. We think the regulatory and tax reform passed in 2013 sowed the right seeds, and we anticipate more robust growth in our economy this year.

Gray: We won't see the full effect of tax reform until 2015, when 2014 taxes are filed. But we hope the lower rate gives people more money to spend now. Sales tax is the major indicator of consumer spending in this state. It will be important to watch this year.

Fritsch: Lower income taxes help attract and retain companies. They are essential to retaining retirees--who have higher rates of discretionary spending--in this state.

Thompson: Tax reform can't be a one-time event. Over the next couple of sessions, the legislature should take a hard look at how the corporate-income tax is calculated. The No. 1 thing that can be done to attract investment is to go to a single-sales factor, which would tax just the percentage of a company's sales made to North Carolina residents. That will reward companies that make capital expenditures and have employees here. I worked on an economic-development deal to bring in a large data center to the western part of the state several years ago. The company was not interested in traditional incentives. It wanted the single factor of sales for its income tax. That is available but only with a $1 billion investment. That's a hurdle that not all companies can jump, but the single-sales...