Wednesday, December 30, 2009

Recovery in Ohio expected to be sluggish

... according to a report from the Ohio State University's Swank Program in Rural-Urban Policy, as reported by the Dayton Daily News. The report was completed by three researchers studying the recessions of 1973-75, 1980, 1981-82, 1990-91, 2001 and the one that began in December 2007, based on Bureau of Labor Statistics data.

Its major conclusion is that Ohio must stop using loss of manufacturing as an excuse for slow recovery. In particular, declines in the auto sector were insufficient to explain Ohio's economic declines over the last forty years. Recovery from the current recession (all other things being equal) might be less severe because Ohio is less reliant on manufacturing and because our housing bubble was relatively small.

I say "all other things being equal" because it should be clearly evident that no one in this country will escape the depression unscathed as long as we continue to rely on the federal government and its "stimulus" packages to spur economic growth.

Economic growth comes from one, and only one, place -- the private sector. Once we get taxes and regulation down to a reasonable level, and restore honest money, we will be amazed by the economic growth that follows.

Assuming we do that, of course.

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