PolitiFactNC: Dan Forest right about HB2’s economic impact
The economic backlash to North Carolina’s House Bill 2 has made national news and led to hundreds of millions of dollars in losses.
But one of the law’s biggest supporters, Republican Lt. Gov. Dan Forest, recently said the losses aren’t really all that much in the grand scheme of things.
“If you look at the most extreme instances of economic impact, by the media and by the universities and the people who come out and say ‘This is the impact,’ that most extreme impact equates to one-tenth of 1 percent of our annual GDP,” Forest said.
Forest was in Texas, supporting the efforts of conservatives there to pass a similar law. PolitiFact North Carolina looked into Forest’s claim and found out that North Carolina’s economy is large enough that Forest was correct.
North Carolina’s economic output is about $510 billion a year, the 10th-largest state economy in the country.
.@DanForestNC said in Texas that #HB2 has harmed North Carolina's economy by 0.1 percent. He's right. https://t.co/zRDS9OQpgV #ncpol #SB6
— PolitiFact NC (@PolitiFactNC) March 8, 2017
For more details, read the full fact check.
Doran: 919-836-2858; Twitter: @PolitiFactNC
PolitiFact North Carolina
Speaker: Dan Forest
Statement: Says of HB2 backlash, that the “most extreme impact equates to one-tenth of 1 percent of our annual GDP.”
Ruling: Forest is correct. The state’s economic output is about $510 billion each year and the range of estimated losses from HB2 centers right around $500 million, which is 0.1 percent of the total output. We rate this claim True.
This story was originally published March 9, 2017 at 10:54 AM with the headline "PolitiFactNC: Dan Forest right about HB2’s economic impact."