In past years I have given my take on the "Development Report Card" from the CFED (Center for Enterprise Development). Some, such as the National Dialogue on Entrepreneurship, try to frame this index as a measure of entrepreneurial activity. It measures quite a few things, but most of them have little or nothing to do with entrepreneurial economic activity. Some examples of superfluous measures include:
- Mass Layoffs (most entrepreneurs don't employ enough people to ever layoff a "mass" of them)
- Involuntary part-time employment (part of the left's belief that entrepreneurs only create low paying, part-time jobs)
- Disparity between Rural and Urban Areas
- Teen pregnancy
- Heart disease
- Voting rate
- Recycling rate
- Two measures of renewable energy (Hey Sen. Kennedy -- that includes those windmills you are fighting off the coast of Massachusetts that you are afraid will spoil your view)
- Average Teacher Salary
- Urban Mass Transit
You get the picture. This index should be called the "Socialist Agenda for America." No wonder they rank Massachusetts and Minnesota at the top year after year.
Out of the 85 variables, they do include 5 measures that they contend assess Entrepreneurial Energy and several measures that look at support for high growth ventures. While high growth ventures are important they are not the heart as sole of entrepreneurial activity and growth in this country. But, they are what make economic development agents look good when they request bigger and bigger budgets.
Government sponsored development agencies are more concerned with expanding their own power and their own control over economic planning than true economic development. Most have been co-opted by the left. If they really wanted to support economic growth they would follow a policy supported by almost every study from around the world on what creates entrepreneurial activity:
- Cut regulation of small business
- Cut and simplify taxes
- Educate entrepreneurs on the basics of business formation and growth management
