Dr. Mike Walden, North Carolina Cooperative Extension economist in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences at N.C. State University, responds:

"The answer is no, and that's a good answer, and I think there are two major reasons. First of all, this recession as most people know, if it is a recession, was sparked by the downturn in the housing market, which in turn was sparked by the big runup in housing prices. Fortunately in North Carolina, we had a runup in housing prices but not as much as in the nation. And in fact, except for some isolated areas, like on the coast and in the mountains, we've had very modest increases relatively in housing prices. So the housing bust has not been as deep here in North Carolina, and that's going to help us. Number two has to do with manufacturing. We were hurt in the 2001 recession because manufacturing really took it hard. We are a state that has more of its base in manufacturing. This time around though, again we're still a manufacturing state, but this time around, manufacturing is actually benefiting from the economic slowdown because of the low-value dollar. The low-value dollar is improving our exports. Exports are up almost 20 percent over last year, and that's helping North Carolina's factories and workers sell more in foreign counties. That should also buffer the effects of a downturn here in North Carolina."