Haslam College of Business - In The News

Most counties in Tennessee have seen job loss since the COVID-19 pandemic

The University of Tennessee Boyd Center for Business and Economic Research has submitted their economic report to Gov. Bill Lee for 2026 — and they found job losses have increased since 2019. The report found that since 2019, about a third of Tenn...

Supreme Court tariff ruling leaves Knoxville businesses waiting for answers

Michael Kofoed, assistant professor of economics at the University of Tennessee, said the ruling creates new questions about how collected tariff revenue will be handled. “Usually what happens is, I as the company, either have to pay the tariff to...

Could Tennessee residents be owed tariff refunds after Supreme Court ruling?

The Boyd Center for Business and Economic Research at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, highlighted the shift in momentum toward President Donald Trump’s trade policy. In total, the state’s inflation-adjusted gross domestic product, also kno...

How will tariff ruling impact the Mid-South?

This time, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled most of the president's tariffs are unconstitutional. President Donald Trump used emergency powers to put them in place. "But that emergency must be very specific,” explained Michael Kofoed, assistant eco...

East TN economics professor ‘cautiously optimistic’ as January jobs report released

UT Assistant Professor Michael Kofoed spoke to 6 News about the economic challenges and opportunities in East Tennessee. After months of negative job growth, Kofoed said he is cautiously optimistic about January’s job report. “Social services make...

New report says TWRA turns conservation into cash for Tennessee communities

This week, the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency (TWRA) released “The Economic Impact of TWRA Operations and Outdoor Recreation” report, prepared by the Boyd Center for Business and Economic Research at the University of Tennessee. TWRA officials s...

Tennessee students get the chance of a lifetime at the Super Bowl

“It is about game day, and we’re all excited about game day," UT professor and program coordinator Debbie Mackey said. "But it’s also some community service, networking − just all kinds of opportunities for the students to participate in before the b...

Reimagining Planner Competencies for Strategic Impact

All the same, the biggest barrier to transforming planning talent is legacy planning systems. Most planners still operate under the 80/20 model: 80% of their time is spent managing forecasts, and only 20% of their time is spent driving business-relev...

UT students set to work behind the scenes at this year’s Super Bowl

“This will be my 11th Super Bowl, and I still am energized to go and share this opportunity with students,” said Debbie Mackey, who has served as faculty advisor for the Big Orange Combine since its inception. “From networking in the area, to hearing...

How the US freight rail industry got dirtier than coal power plants

Electric locomotives are viable for shorter routes and replacing diesel locomotives in switch yards, but for long distances they're limited by battery weight, said Alex Scott, a professor of supply chain management at the University of Tennessee. Ba...

Opinion: Supreme Court’s broker liability case could reshape trucking safety

The Supreme Court will decide whether the Federal Aviation Administration Authorization Act (F4A) preempts state negligence claims against freight brokers, resolving a major circuit split. If the Court shields brokers from negligent-selection suits, ...

Opinion: This isn’t the first time America tried steep tariffs to save the day

Today, 2025 feels like a mixtape of counterproductive economic policies long debunked by history. Yet unlike Smoot-Hawley, current tariff rates did not emerge from Congress but from executive fiat. This expansive use of presidential “emergency” po...

Beef prices up 16% in one year, according to federal data

Coffee is up almost 20% in the past year. The price of beef has increased 16% in a year’s time. Shelter and food have each increased by more than 3%. "It's not as high as it was back in the day, but it is still stubbornly high,” explained Mi...

Best Way for Employers to Support Employees with Chronic Mental Illness Is by Offering Flexibility

Not Missing Out on Peak Performers Contrary to stereotypes, people with chronic anxiety and depression, such as those we studied, are generally as capable of success in the workplace as anyone else in the right context. Extremely high performers,...

New ‘Butcher Build­ing’ owner starts with leg up

Top Ten­nessee eco­nom­ists char­ac­ter­ize the state’s fin­an­cial out­look for 2026 as “pre­cari­ously pos­it­ive,” advising state offi­cials to have a “cau­tious” mind­set while plan­ning spend­ing. “I think we’re not really at risk of not bein...

Joan MacLeod Heminway on Friends-and-Family Insider Trading

Heminway investigates insider trading occurring in the context of friendship, familial, or romantic relationships and presents findings from her empirical study of this friends-and-family insider trading.