Charlotte's Banking Woes Are Trickling Down

The ripple effect of the financial slowdown is becoming more obvious in Charlotte. A local law firm for the banking community now says it is closing its uptown office. Officials at Dewey and LeBoeuf say nine associates in Charlotte will lose their jobs when the firm closes its uptown office at the end of December. Other law firms have announced cuts in recent weeks, too. Bicycle courier Rich Dillen says the slowdown in financial legal work is evident in his daily route between the Charlotte's banks and law firms. "I was doing about 50 or 60 jobs a day back when everybody was throwing a lot of money at each other, and now I'm down to about 20 or 30 jobs a day," says Dillen, who works for Mercury Messengers. "A lot of the paperwork that when through the attorneys to the banks to make a lot of the money move just doesn't happen any more." Dillen says if deliveries continue to drop, he's worried about losing his job too. Economists at UNC-Charlotte did a computer model of the banking sector and estimate that for every 1000 banking jobs the city loses, another 390 jobs in related businesses will be cut, too.