Hard work. Long hours. That’s reality for America’s small business owners. You know what it takes, and you know who built your businesses. You also know that time is one of your most valuable assets. You don’t get second chances. Between now and Dec. 31 — except for important holidays, family events and religious observances […]
Economics and politics obviously overlap. Specifically, they should converge when policy is made. But economics and politics definitely are not the same. Economics is rooted in substance — trying to understand and explain how the economy works, including how policy affects the economy. Meanwhile, politics can be rooted in substance, but it just as easily […]
Given the stubbornly slow recovery in Mesa County and elsewhere in the United States, it’s hardly surprising business development and job growth remain the predominant campaign issues in races for everything from the courthouse to the White House. As a strategist of former President Bill Clinton put it so eloquently way back in 1992: “It’s […]
If you’re concerned about how high federal government spending and debt have reached in recent years, the latest numbers on the current fiscal year offer little hope for positive change. To review, federal outlays jumped from $2.73 trillion in 2007 to $2.98 trillion in 2008, and $3.52 trillion in 2009. This vast increase in spending […]
It seems like Washington can’t agree on anything these days, except maybe one thing: small business. It seems everyone in Washington loves small business — or pretends they do. If you watch the news or listen to the ads, you’ll hear candidates on both sides of the aisle vow to help small businesses grow and […]
Yep, I’m talking about the talk-meister in chief, our president, who took time out of his busy, soak-the-rich fund-raising efforts to talk with all us little folks here in Grand Junction. Well, not all of us. Some of us had to work. Some of us had to make money to pay taxes so Barack Obama […]
Several times a year, the indicators tracking various components of the Mesa County economy all seem to come out at once. When that confluence occurs, it only makes sense to take a more thorough look at what the assembled pieces of the puzzle portray and to try to answer the question that invariably arises: What’s […]
America’s small business owners were shocked and angered when the president of the United States recently diminished their sacrifices and contributions to the building of our nation. But few expressed surprise. They realized long ago that President Barack Obama views them merely as funders for his plans to expand federal government. “If you’ve got a […]
Politicians on a bipartisan basis love to talk glowingly about entrepreneurs and the businesses they build and work to grow. Unfortunately, that rhetoric too often hides a fundamental misunderstanding about the process of entrepreneurship or economic risk takers themselves. Those misunderstandings or hostilities usually become evident through policymaking. That is, while saying nice things about […]
I don’t know about you, but I was heartened to see the crowds at Chik-fil-A appreciation day in response to the typical, liberal overreaction to someone who dared say something the left holds sacrosanct. The fact local law enforcement had to be called out to handle all of the traffic should speak loudly to those […]