College is often the time when students discover which career path they want to pursue, through coursework, internships, and hands-on experiences. New research examining state minimum wage increases, however, shows how budget pressures can disrupt access to these formative opportunities and ultimately affect who enters STEM careers.  

The researchers analyzed administrative data from research grants at 32 U.S. universities between 2001 and 2019, tracking how labs adjusted staffing when state minimum wage changed. They found that in the year following a minimum wage increase, labs reduced undergraduate research assistant employment by 7.4%. Students who were in college when these increases occurred graduated having worked 18.1% fewer quarters in labs compared to what they may have experienced otherwise.  

Just 19% of the approximately 25,000 census tracts potentially eligible for Opportunity Zone (OZ) designation are “More likely to attract OZ investment, with larger impact,” per the Urban Institute’s new OZ Designation Tool.1 The majority (68%) of potentially eligible tracts were found to be “Less likely to attract OZ investment,” while the remaining 13% were determined likely to attract capital regardless of OZ designation. Breaking the data down further, this article showcases state-level aggregations of the percentage of potentially eligible tracts across each categorization to paint a picture of which states stand to benefit the most from the OZ program based on the count of tracts likely to receive investments.

As the first group of Tech Hub awardees approaches the end of their first year of implementation funding, hubs are gathering their consortia to share progress and chart next steps. As part of SSTI’s work with the Technology-based Economic Development (TBED) Community of Practice, program director Casey Nemecek attended the annual consortium meetings for two hubs in October: the Sustainable Polymers Tech Hub and the Nevada Tech Hub. 

Akron’s Polymer Cluster Connectivity Conference brought together the region’s polymer industry leaders, researchers, and workforce partners for progress updates and strategic discussions. The event concluded with an Innovation Expo featuring technologies from regional companies and startups, including the first cohort from Synthe6, the hub’s accelerator program for materials-based startups.  

The U.S. Department of the Treasury (Treasury) recently issued three new FAQs for the State Small Business Credit Initiative 2.0 (SSBCI) program. These FAQs clarify and reiterate the timeline for the end of the Capital Program, and the deadlines by which participating jurisdictions must request disbursement of any remaining allocated Capital Program funds.

In summary:

• All disbursement, technical support, and other program actions performed by Treasury will cease on March 11, 2028 (FAQ #8 in the general section).  
• All Capital Program disbursement requests must be submitted to Treasury by December 31, 2027 (FAQ #4 under Section III.b)
• Treasury expects to terminate disbursements to jurisdictions that have not qualified for their second tranche disbursement by their three-year anniversaries (FAQ #1 in Section III.c)

SSTI has confirmed with the SSBCI team at Treasury that no states have failed to meet their three-year deadline, although we recognize this to be an ongoing concern as some jurisdictions’ allocation agreement dates are as recent as mid-2024.

Note: The research careers for this year’s triple winners support the underlying arguments for public involvement in technology-based economic development. Well-designed and sustained public-private regional innovation initiatives—the work of SSTI and its member organizations—can make a positive difference for local competitiveness.  

When economist Joseph Schumpeter described creative destruction in the 1940s, he captured a paradox at the heart of capitalism: progress depends on disruption. Old industries must give way so that new ones can emerge. For decades, this insight has shaped how we understand economic change, but Schumpeter could only describe the pattern, not explain why it began when it did or how societies sustain it over time. 2025 Nobel laureates Joel Mokyr, Philippe Aghion, and Peter Howitt built upon Schumpeter’s foundational ideas to show how continuous innovation became the defining feature of modern growth and how it can be strengthened or undermined by public policy.