Has the entrepreneurial spirit abandoned rural and small town America? Maybe. Excerpt:
Pretty much every story describing the state of the American economy these days has a subtextual—if not outright stated—message: “This is why Donald Trump is happening.” So it goes with a new report mapping out how America has recovered from the recession of the last decade. We are seeing significant fracture between urban areas and non-urban or rural environments when looking at the creation of new businesses. Entrepreneurship is becoming increasingly consolidated in major city centers. And even after the economy began recovering, new business creation did not return to previous levels in less-populated environments.
The report is by the Economic Innovation Group, a pro-entrepreneurship advocacy group. Their report, the “New Map of Economic Growth and Recovery,” shows that the creation of new businesses in general has plunged compared to previous years going back to 1992. And yes, that includes previous smaller recessions like the dot-com bust. Their numbers show more new firms being created in 2001 and 2002 than in 2012 and 2013.
Here’s a chart from the article that all-too-clearly tells the tale:
Part of this is, of course, over-regulation. As a comment to this article pithily points out, walk into a local gas station, barber shop or lunch counter sometime and look at the number of licenses and registrations that are required to do business. In Texas, it takes something like six months of education and hundred of dollars in fees to legally cut people’s fingernails – and Texas is correctly considered one of the most business-friendly states in the country.
And the current denizen of the Imperial Mansion has never seen a business regulation he wasn’t in favor of. This is the same President who spends a lot of time bemoaning “income inequality,” but favors anti-growth, anti-business policies that crush opportunity.
It’s like a Greek tragedy – except that Greek tragedies are meant to entertain. No wonder Donald Trump is gaining traction.
