The Cato Institute’s Jim Powell examines how the once-prosperous Connecticut economy became one of the worst performing in the nation. His answer? Misguided big government policies that squandered the state’s proud legacy of entrepreneurship and innovation.
Perhaps with the complacency of old money, Connecticut policymakers came to believe they didn’t need to compete for investors and entrepreneurs – the key people who make prosperity happen.
The devastatingly accurate piece points to Connecticut’s economic performance in recent years, drawing heavily from the Yankee Institute’s List of Lasts. While many politicians scapegoat the closing of major factories, Powell rebuts this argument:
Many politicians like to blame Connecticut’s decline on things beyond their control like factory closings, but there’s nothing new about losing employers. Change has been the natural order of things since the beginning of time.
He also points to the coming exodus of high-wealth individuals from the financial sector as calamitous for Connecticut’s economic future:
Thalius Hechsher, who heads global development for Apex Fund, also moved his business to Florida. He said, “There’s no need to drag people down here. It’s a zero-income-tax jurisdiction.”
The piece brings into sharp relief the stakes in the contest of ideas between big government, centrally planned solutions and the free market, limited government solutions offered by the Yankee Institute. Hopefully Connecticut’s elected officials will get the message before it is too late.
Ruth Morrison
August 15, 2013 @ 12:04 am
Saw another business with it’s door shut today in Westbrook and another one in Clinton, that says thanks for the last 50 years. They are calling it quits and closing their doors. How many long term small companies have to go out of business before the people in CT see that doing the same things and voting for the same people is not working. Check out the “List of Lasts” by Yankee Ins. This once thriving state is just an empty shell of its former self. Has anyone noticed how the infrastructure is decaying all around because no one has any money to maintain it? The unions have the continual road work contracts from now until never but nothing else is being kept up.
Don E McGlynn
August 17, 2013 @ 9:47 am
Jul 1964 to Jul 2013. Gone and glad after nearly 50 yrs and NOT looking back.
Michael Werner
August 19, 2013 @ 4:02 pm
As long as the politicians are owned by the public sector unions, nothing will change. For the majority of elected officials, the only thing that matters is power. They don’t care about doing the right thing. They’ll do what they have to do to keep their constituency happy and retain power. Since the unions provide money and manpower to help keep these dopes in office, they march lockstep with whatever the union bosses want. Some day in the not too distant future, CT will have to default on its pension obligations or on their debt or both. By then, the only people left in the state will be welfare recipients and government workers. Everyone else will have moved out. Then who will you tax to pay the bills.
Rita Conrad
August 28, 2013 @ 10:32 am
How unfortunate that such a beautiful state with so many amenities is failing. And, it’s failing at such an alarming rate that the general public doesn’t see it happening and allows their chosen leaders to deny it as well. Yankee Institute’s numbers are right, but when they were recently used at a local NE CT legislative breakfast they were ridiculed by the Democrat Senators in attendance. It was hard to sit among friends/neighbors and realize that they are being bamboozled by the ones they support for office. The rest of us are leaving the state. They will be left behind to deal with the mess.
Laura Stilwell
September 30, 2013 @ 11:34 pm
It’s so disturbing to see this happening to my home state. As a resident of Texas for over two decades, I’ve seen up close and personal, how a Red State with conservative policies flourished and continues to do so with less crime and deterioration than the Blue States with Liberals at the helm. Need not look beyond the Blue for Blame. The facts are presented up in my face. Democrats have turned my beloved home state into a disgrace. Please people, look to how states like Texas have fared the storm well before we see you down in the same pit of Democrat run Detroit Hell.