It's the business climate, stupid

When it comes to politics, we showcase a presidential candidate from Vermont who competes for Southern votes with appeals to Confederate flag-loving pickup truck drivers. When it comes to business, we don't waste time with analogies. We simply declare Southerners brain dead.

When North Carolina launched a recent letter-writing and advertising campaign to lure Massachusetts companies south, Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino suggested that the North Carolinians "have been in the sun too long." State Senator Mark Montigny of New Bedford said there is no real competition for biotech businesses, because "ultimately, they need to be in states where there is significant intellectual capital, and I hardly think North Carolina will be serious competition for the intellectual capital here. The main reason they're here is because of the academic research centers -- I don't think a cheesy ad in a newspaper would result in much."

Massachusetts politicians who "think" like that should have a chat with James C. Mullen, president and chief executive officer of Biogen Idec. As a result of a merger finalized last month between Cambridge-based Biogen and Idec Pharmaceuticals of San Diego, he now heads the third-largest pharmaceutical company in the world. He is looking to grow more through acquisition and licensing of products from other companies.

Of the cocky local mind-set, Mullen says, "They're just naive if they think North Carolina doesn't have the labor and resources we need. They need to travel a little."

Currently, Biogen Idec employs 1,500 in Massachusetts and 400 in North Carolina. "A certain inertia," as Mullen puts it, along with the huge cost associated with relocation are likely to keep the company headquartered in Cambridge. But keeping and growing a range of jobs here -- well, that's another story.

It's not a quality of life problem. People like living in the area. But the cost is an issue for them and their employers. "Every business that wants to be successful will arrive at a point of time where they have to ask if the benefits of being in Massachusetts outweigh the costs," says Mullen.

Massachusetts, he says, is not asking key questions that need to answered, such as: How can we convince companies that are already here to grow, thrive, and expand here? How do we keep the jobs here?

Mitt Romney pledged during the gubernatorial campaign to keep and grow jobs in Massachusetts. According to Mullen, the Romney team reached out to him twice, and neither instance had anything to do with keeping or growing jobs. During the 2002 campaign, he was asked if candidate Romney could hold a staged event at Biogen. And during the first year of the Romney administration, he says he was called by a Romney fund-raiser and asked for a contribution. Recently, someone from the office of House Speaker Thomas M. Finneran contacted Biogen Idec to inquire about taking a photograph of the headquarters for a newsletter Finneran puts out. Mullen was in North Carolina when the inquiry was made.

North Carolina "makes it easy to do business responsibly," says Mullen. He swears that is not a euphemism for allowing companies to do business without state regulation. He also insists, "I am not looking for anything from the Romney administration." He is just pointing out the difference between Massachusetts and North Carolina, where there is "a great alliance between the public and private sector . . . I talk to someone in that chain several times a month."

Massachusetts is banking on biotech as the underpinning of a new boom. We are putting the lab coat-clad geniuses along the Charles on the pedestal once reserved for the computer nerds along Route 128. The geniuses will be able to afford the cost of housing, health care, and education. But what about the average worker whose task it is to manufacture and deliver the product dreamed up by genius researchers?

"The economy, stupid," is really about "the jobs, stupid." Smart people know that, and believe it or not, Bay Staters, some of them live in places like North Carolina.

Correction: During Game 7 of the American League Championship Series, New York Yankee Aaron Boone hit a home run off Boston Red Sox pitcher Tim Wakefield at the bottom, not the top, of the 11th inning.

Joan Vennochi's e-mail address is vennochi@globe.com.