OCEAN ISLE BEACH – Coastal Carolina businesses are reportedly unsure about how a new state law on summer vacations is going to affect them this year.
Let me offer them a prediction: their summertime receipts will jump significantly. That’s to be expected. Lobbyists for these industries played a major role in pushing for legislation requiring North Carolina school districts to scoot the beginning of the academic year towards Labor Day. With a few more weeks of August available, hoteliers, camps, and resorts expect to do very well, indeed, during this popular period.
But let me add another prediction that some may not find as staid: North Carolina’s hospitality, restaurant, and tourism industries will not see any significant change in their annual billings, or at least not change that can be attributed to the legislation.
How can both propositions be true? Because beach resorts – and the mountain cousins – do not comprise the totality of the industry. There are thousands of establishments across the state that attract recreation and tourism business throughout the year, ranging from motels and lodges to restaurants, theaters, sports attractions, and kid-oriented parks. Since much of their business is either routine or local, the question of when school starts and stops doesn’t matter as much to them as it does to seasonal attractions.
When school vacations were extended further into August, the latter acquired a competitive position vs. the former. Given the fact that families typically have a set amount of money they are willing to spend on leisure and recreation, the beaches may well gain at the expense of other places. Folks might book a longer stay here at Ocean Isle, spending money they might otherwise have used to go out to eat a few more times back home in Charlotte, or to visit the North Carolina Zoo in Asheboro, or to hit the movie theaters more frequently in Greensboro.
I don’t have a problem with the idea of starting school a little later. I admit to being flabbergasted at the discovery that some school districts were starting their academic years during the first week of August. But I think it would have been more appropriate to let districts make their own decisions in this regard. Assuming a set number of days in the school year, a state mandate about the start of school essentially translates into a state mandate about the end of school in May or June.
There was no compelling need to create statewide uniformity on the issue, in my book, but it’s done. Now expect to see stories soon celebrating the economic bonanza the longer August break is supposedly creating – without anyone noting the likelihood that any economic gains here at the beach are coming at the expense of less-organized businesses elsewhere in North Carolina.
Hood is president of the John Locke Foundation.