Economics – Page 48 – artdiamondblog.com

Tech Start-Up Grows with No Outside Money

(p. B6) . . . , it’s possible to create a huge tech company without taking venture capital, and without spending far beyond your means. It’s possible, in other words, to start a tech company that runs more like a normal business than a debt-fueled rocket ship careening out of control. Believe it or not, start-ups don’t even have to be headquartered in San Francisco or Silicon Valley.
There is perhaps no better example of this other way than MailChimp, a 16-year-old Atlanta-based company that makes marketing software for small businesses. If you’ve heard of MailChimp, it’s either because you are one of its 12 million customers or because you were hooked on “Serial,” the blockbuster true-crime podcast that MailChimp sponsored.
Under the radar, slowly and steadily, and without ever taking a dime in outside funding or spending more than it earned, MailChimp has been building a behemoth. According to Ben Chestnut, MailChimp’s co-founder and chief executive, the company recorded $280 million in revenue in 2015 and is on track to top $400 million in 2016. MailChimp has always been profitable, Mr. Chestnut said, though he declined to divulge exact margins. The company — which has repeatedly turned down overtures from venture capitalists and is wholly owned by Mr. Chestnut and his co-founder, Dan Kurzius — now employs about 550 people, and by next year it will be close to 700.
As a private company, MailChimp has long kept its business metrics secret, but Mr. Chestnut wants to publicize its numbers now to show the road less traveled: If you want to run a successful tech company, you don’t have to follow the path of “Silicon Valley.” You can simply start a business, run it to serve your customers, and forget about outside investors and growth at any cost.
. . .
“Every time we sat down with potential investors, they never seemed to understand small business,” Mr. Chestnut said. Venture capitalists always wanted MailChimp to serve “enterprise companies,” large businesses with thousands of employees and, potentially, thousands to spend.
“Everybody we talked to said, ‘You’re sitting on a gold mine, and if you pivot to enterprise, you could be huge,'” Mr. Chestnut said. “But something in our gut always said that didn’t feel right.”

For the full story, see:
Farhad Manjoo. “STATE OF THE ART; A Road Less Traveled to Success as a Start-Up.” The New York Times (Thurs., Oct. 6, 2016): B1 & B6.
(Note: ellipses added.)
(Note: the online version of the story has the date Oct. 5, 2016, and has the title “STATE OF THE ART; MailChimp and the Un-Silicon Valley Way to Make It as a Start-Up.”)

Immigration Depresses Wages of Low-Wage Americans

(p. A11) Mr. Borjas is himself an immigrant, having at age 12 fled from Cuba to Miami with his widowed mother in 1962, just before the Cuban Missile Crisis shut down legal exits. As a labor economist, he has spent much of his academic career studying the effects of immigration on the American jobs market, often arguing that immigration depresses wages, or job opportunities, at the lower end of the scale. Here he notes that, on balance, the added production supplied by immigrants makes a modest contribution to U.S. economic growth. He generously provides readers with arguments on all sides, including Milton Friedman’s wry observation that illegal immigrants are of more net benefit to the American economy than legals because they make less use of welfare-state services.
. . .
After totting up the pluses and minuses, Mr. Borjas concludes that immigration has very little effect on the lives of most Americans. He does worry, however, that some future wave might bring along with it the “institutional, cultural and political baggage that may have hampered development in the poor countries” from which immigrants often come, and he sees a need for reforms.

For the full review, see:

GEORGE MELLOAN. “BOOKSHELF; The Immigration Debate We Need.” The Wall Street Journal (Weds., Oct. 19, 2016): A11.
(Note: ellipsis added.)

The book under review, is:
Borjas, George J. We Wanted Workers: Unraveling the Immigration Narrative. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2016.

Unions Spend $108 Million on 2016 Elections

Source of graph: online version of the WSJ article quoted and cited below.

(p. A1) PHILADELPHIA–U.S. labor unions are plowing money into the 2016 elections at an unprecedented rate, largely in an effort to help elect Hillary Clinton and give Democrats a majority in the Senate.

According to the most recent campaign-finance filings, unions spent about $108 million on the elections from January 2015 through the end of August [2016], a 38% jump from $78 million during the same period leading up to the 2012 election, and nearly double their 2008 total in the same period. Nearly 85% of their spending this year has supported Democrats.

For the full story, see:
BRODY MULLINS, REBECCA BALLHAUS and MICHELLE HACKMAN. “Labor Unions Step Up Presidential-Election Spending.” The Wall Street Journal (Weds., Oct. 19, 2016): A1 & A4.
(Note: ellipsis, and bracketed year, added.)
(Note: the online version of the story has the date Oct. 18, 2016, and has the title “Unions Up the Election Ante.”)

Regulations Cause Sluggish Economy by Slowing Startup Creation

Source of graph: online version of the WSJ article quoted and cited below.

(p. A2) The U.S. economy is inching along, productivity is flagging and millions of Americans appear locked out of the labor market.
One key factor intertwined with this loss of dynamism: The U.S. is creating startup businesses at historically low rates.
. . .
The share of private firms less than a year old has dropped from more than 12% during much of the 1980s to only about 8% since 2010. In 2014, the most recent year of data, the startup rate was the second-lowest on record, after 2010, according to Census Bureau figures released last month, so there’s little sign of a postrecession rebound.
. . .
Rules and regulations also could be at play. Goldman Sachs economists in part blame the cumulative effect of regulations enacted since the Great Recession for reducing the availability of credit and raising the cost of doing business for small firms, making them less competitive.
. . .
There is some disagreement on whether tech firms have fallen into the same doldrums as other startups like mom-and-pop shops. Mr. Haltiwanger and colleagues at the Federal Reserve and Census Bureau find evidence they have, with significant detriment to the economy.
“It may be that we are designing things here in the U.S. as rapidly as ever,” Mr. Haltiwanger said. “We’re just not producing here. That’s not good news for U.S. productivity.”
Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology delved into state business licensing information and found somewhat different but also discouraging results. That is, tech entrepreneurs are generating good ideas and founding companies at a healthy pace, but those ventures aren’t breaking out into successful big companies.
“The system for translating good, high-quality foundings into a growth firm, that system seems to have broken,” said Scott Stern, an MIT professor and co-author of the study on startups.

For the full commentary, see:
Sparshott, Jeffrey. “THE OUTLOOK; Sputtering Startups Weigh Down Growth.” The Wall Street Journal (Mon., Oct. 24, 2016): A2.
(Note: ellipses added.)
(Note: the online version of the commentary has the date Oct. 23, 2016 title “THE OUTLOOK; Sputtering Startups Weigh on U.S. Economic Growth.” The passages quoted above include a couple of sentences that appeared in the online, but not the print, version of the article.)

Land Use Regulations Increase Income Inequality

Source of graph: online version of the WSJ article quoted and cited below.

(p. A3) In this year’s election, candidates have focused blame for rising income inequality on broad economic forces, from globalization to the decline of the American manufacturing base. But a growing body of research suggests a more ordinary factor: the price of the average single-family home for sale, from Fairfield, Conn., to Portland, Ore.

According to research by Daniel Shoag, an associate professor of public policy at Harvard University, and Peter Ganong, a postdoctoral fellow at the National Bureau of Economic Research, a decadeslong trend in which the income gap between the poorest and richest states steadily closed has been upended by growth in land-use regulations.
Moving to a wealthier area in search of job opportunities has historically been a way to promote economic equality, allowing workers to pursue higher-paying jobs elsewhere. But those wage gains lose their appeal if they are eaten up by higher housing costs. The result: More people stay put and lose out on potential higher incomes.
. . .
Messrs. Shoag and Ganong looked at mentions of “land-use” in appeals-court cases and found the number of references began rising sharply around 1970, with some states seeing a much larger increase than others. For example, the share of cases mentioning land use for New York rose 265% between 1950 and 2010 and 644% in California during the same period. By contrast, it increased by only 80% in Alabama.

For the full story, see:
LAURA KUSISTO. “Land Use Rules Under Fire.” The Wall Street Journal (Weds., Oct. 19, 2016): A3.
(Note: ellipsis added.)
(Note: the online version of the story has the date Oct. 18, 2016, and has the title “As Land-Use Rules Rise, Economic Mobility Slows, Research Says.” A few extra words appear in the online version quoted above, that were left out of the print version.)

The research by Ganong and Shoag, mentioned above, is:

Ganong, Peter, and Daniel Shoag. “Why Has Regional Income Convergence in the U.S. Declined?” Harvard University, John F. Kennedy School of Government, Working Paper Series, Jan. 2015.

FCC Regulations Motivated by Cronyism, Not Economics

(p. A13) . . . , this burgeoning competition between fixed and mobile has always been predictable and yet has figured not at all in the Federal Communications Commission’s regulatory efforts, which paint the country as descending into an uncompetitive broadband hell.
A new study by economists Gerald Faulhaber and Hal Singer details how an agency that once prized economic analysis increasingly ignores or disregards economics in its regulatory findings. Why? Because if it acknowledged the increasing competitiveness of the market, there would be nothing to regulate, no favor-factory opportunities for its political sponsors to milk.

For the full commentary, see:
HOLMAN W. JENKINS, JR. “BUSINESS WORLD; Big Cable and Mobile Are Ready to Rumble; Technology is about to upend Washington’s dire prescriptions for a broadband monopoly.” The Wall Street Journal (Sat., Oct. 8, 2016): A13.
(Note: ellipsis added.)

The working paper mentioned above, is:
Faulhaber, Gerald, and Hal Singer. “The Curious Absence of Economic Analysis at the Federal Communications Commission: An Agency in Search of a Mission.” 2016.

Medal-Winning Official Steals Concrete from Public Road and Sells to Cronies

(p. A4) MOSCOW — Corruption in Russia sometimes amounts to highway robbery, literally.
A senior prison official has been accused of stealing the pavement from a 30-mile stretch of public highway in the Komi Republic, a thinly populated, heavily forested region in northern Russia, the daily newspaper Kommersant reported on its website on Wednesday [January 13, 2016].
. . .
While he was in Komi, Mr. Protopopov won a medal for fostering “spiritual unity,” the Kommersant report said, without specifying whether the unity was with the crews doing the illicit road work.

For the full story, see:
NEIL MacFARQUHAR. “Don’t Blame Snow for Missing Road in Russia’s North.” The New York Times (Thurs., JAN. 14, 2016): A4.
(Note: ellipsis, and bracketed date, added.)
(Note: online version of the story has the date JAN. 13, 2016, and has the title “Missing a Road in Russia? This May Be Why.”)

“Politicized Regulatory State” Cuts Hiring and Slows Innovation

Source of graph: online version of the WSJ article quoted and cited below.

(p. A13) Sclerotic growth is America’s overriding economic problem. From 1950 to 2000, the U.S. economy grew at an average rate of 3.5% annually. Since 2000, it has grown at half that rate–1.76%. Even in the years since the bottom of the great recession in 2009, which should have been a time of fast catch-up growth, the economy has only grown at 2%.
. . .
. . . the U.S. economy is simply overrun by an out-of-control and increasingly politicized regulatory state. If it takes years to get the permits to start projects and mountains of paper to hire people, if every step risks a new criminal investigation, people don’t invest, hire or innovate.
. . .
How much more growth is really possible from better policies? To get an idea, see the nearby chart plotting 2014 income per capita for 189 countries against the World Bank’s “Distance to Frontier” ease-of-doing-business measure for the same year. The measure combines individual indicators, including starting a business, dealing with construction permits, protecting minority investors, paying taxes and trading across borders.
. . .
Most of all, the country needs a dramatic legal and regulatory simplification, restoring the rule of law. Middle-aged America is living in a hoarder’s house of a legal system. State and local impediments such as occupational licensing and zoning are also part of the problem.
. . .
There is hope. Washington lawmakers need to bring about a grand bargain, moving the debate from “they’re getting their special deal, I want mine,” to “I’m losing my special deal, so they’d better lose theirs too.”

For the full commentary, see:
JOHN H. COCHRANE. “Ending America’s Slow-Growth Tailspin; The U.S. economy needs a dramatic legal and regulatory simplification.” The Wall Street Journal (Tues., May 3, 2016): A13.
(Note: ellipses added.)
(Note: the online version of the commentary has the date May 2, 2016.)

Many Can Have Good Jobs, and Good Lives, Without College

Source of graph: online version of the WSJ article quoted and cited below.

(p. B1) American employers struggling to find enough qualified industrial workers are turning to Germany for a solution to plug the U.S. skills gap: vocational training.

Two million U.S. manufacturing jobs will remain vacant over the next decade due to a shortage of trained workers, according to an analysis by the Manufacturing Institute, a nonprofit advocacy group affiliated with the National Association of Manufacturers, and professional-services firm Deloitte LLP.
While the Obama administration has invested millions of dollars to promote skills-based training, it remains a tough sell in a country where four-year university degrees are seen as the more viable path to good-paying jobs. The Bureau of Labor Statistics said two-thirds of high school graduates who enrolled in college in 2015 opted for four-year degrees.
. . .
In Germany, roughly half of high-school graduates opt for (p. B2) high-octane apprenticeships rather than college degrees. One draw: almost certain employment.
German apprentices spend between three and four days a week training at a company and between one and two days at a public vocational school. The company pays wages and tuition. After three years, apprentices take exams to receive nationally recognized certificates in their occupation. Many continue working full time at the company.
The Labor Department said 87% of apprentices in the U.S. are employed after completing their training programs. Workers who complete apprenticeships earn $50,000 annually on average, or higher than the median U.S. annual wage of $44,720,

For the full story, see:
ELIZABETH SCHULZE. “U.S. Turns to Germany to Fill Jobs.” The Wall Street Journal (Tues., Sept. 27, 2016): B1-B2.
(Note: ellipsis added.)
(Note: the online version of the story has the date Sept. 26, 2016, and has the title “U.S. Companies Turn to German Training Model to Fill Jobs Gap.”)

New Tech in Costly Cars “Trickles Down” to Cheaper Cars

(p. B5) Chances are slim that the car, starting at just over $200,000 ($215,000 as tested), will grab market share from the Toyota Corolla and Honda Civic. But in the four days I had the GT, my wife was astonished at my eagerness to run errands of any kind.
. . .
Surely, few people buy cars this expensive, but such vehicles are important because they pioneer technology that trickles down to everyday cars. Recall that anti-lock brakes showed up first on supercars in the late 1970s. (The 570GT’s brakes are very good, by the way.)
Perhaps McLaren’s carbon-fiber tub chassis structure will be common in the future.

For the full commentary, see:
TOM VOELK. “Driven: McLaren 570GT: High Speed Meets High Style (at a High Price).” The New York Times (Fri., NOV. 3, 2016): B5.
(Note: ellipsis added.)
(Note: the online version of the commentary has the date NOV. 3, 2016, and has the title “Driven: Video Review: McLaren 570GT Is a Rare Blend of Speed and Comfort.”)