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SELMA — California’s $44 billion agricultural industry faces a worsening labor shortage as farmworkers age, more return home to Mexico and fewer new migrants arrive to replace them.

AOL Co-Founder Steve Case has a great perspective on the country’s vast and varied startup universe. Now Chairman of Startup America and CEO of Revolution, a venture capital fund based in Washington, D.C., Case wrote a February blog post for the Wall Street Journal describing what he’s dubbed the “rise of the rest.”

The U.S. has become more competitive with other nations in manufacturing costs over the past decade.

A new report, “The Hidden STEM Economy,” reveals that a university degree is not required for 27.5 percent of all jobs in the San Jose area in the fields of science, technology, engineering and math. The number is even higher — 36 percent — in San Francisco and the East Bay.

Southern California Edison says its closure of the troubled San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station will force the company to lay off 900 workers in the next few months.

California’s San Joaquin Valley is one of the richest agricultural regions in the world, with Fresno County farmers receiving a record $6.8 billion in revenues last year. But the region also consistently ranks among the nation’s most impoverished.

California’s enterprise zones have been a part of state government since the mid-1980s, but there is disagreement as to whether they have successfully attracted and retained businesses or merely shifted commercial activities from communities without zones to others where the program is in effect.

Digital technology is transforming manufacturing, making it leaner and smarter, and raising the prospect of an American industrial renaissance.

Despite high unemployment, manufacturers find themselves short of skilled candidates for many jobs, such as operating or programming computer-controlled cutting tools or repairing sophisticated machinery. Manufacturers also fret that the U.S. isn’t producing enough engineers to design products and factory processes—and drive innovation.

WASHINGTON, D.C., 06/10/13 – According to the second quarter National Association of Manufacturers (NAM)/IndustryWeek Survey of Manufacturers released today, manufacturers’ concerns over health care and insurance costs are mounting. In addition, the unfavorable business climate due to taxes and regulation and uncertainties related to the political climate continue to be top concerns for manufacturers. More than half of survey respondents stated they were either not prepared or uncertain about how their firm planned to implement provisions of the Affordable Care Act at the beginning of 2014.

The headline numbers for the May jobs report are about what you would expect for a New Normal economy stuck in 2% growth mode: 175,000 net new jobs last month, the unemployment rate ticking up to 7.6%. No broad signs of acceleration; just the opposite, in fact. As Barclays bank points out, the three-month average increase in nonfarm payrolls through May is now 155,000 vs. a first-quarter average of 207,000. (And at May’s pace of job creation, it would take another 58 months to get back to 5% unemployment.)

ACR 48, which designated May as “Start a Small Business Month” and highlights economic policies that encourage the success of small businesses in California was voted down by the Assembly Committee on Jobs, Economic Development .

The U.S. economy has been a mixed bag during the first half of 2013. We have made some progress, particularly when looking at the all-time highs in the stock market or the consumer confidence measures that are now at levels not seen since before the financial crisis. Real GDP is growing modestly, up 2.4% in the first quarter, and it is expected to rise 1.8% in the current quarter. Much of that increase can be attributed to decent gains in consumer spending and steady increases in housing construction, both of which have helped boost output and lift sentiment.

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — Three business reasons — quicker, closer and custom — prompted computer maker Lenovo Group to open its first U.S. manufacturing operation in North Carolina instead of low-cost foreign locations like Mexico or China, its North American president said.

. . . new economic study produced by leading academic economists that examines the role that development of oil from California’s Monterey Shale Formation can play in the future economic well-being of the state of California.. . . documenting the potential impact of development of the Monterey Shale on job creation, economic activity, personal incomes, and government tax revenues over the next 15 years.