Executive Summary

Lessons from the Past for Urban Policy in the Era of Trump

The stunning election of Donald Trump as president throws the future of urban policy into doubt. During the campaign he promised to bring new jobs and improved infrastructure to the inner cities, but so far he has furnished no details. Some of the strategies carried out by cities and states in the past may offer the incoming administration some guidance.

 

 

The Ghost of Christmas Future:

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The last installment of the Oscar-Forgotten Small Business Trilogy finally has arrived with its startling and life-altering conclusions. In the Ghost of Christmas Past we reviewed the underlying truthfulness of the Small Business Truism. What is the Small Business Truism, you ask? That small business create the most jobs and drive the American economy. The second installment, Ghost of Christmas Present, picked up from the debris of the Truism's validity and recreated a new Truism: that YOUNG (and Old) Firms create the most jobs in the American economy. Also in the Ghost of Christmas Past, we introduced leading characters in the New Small Business Truism: start ups, gazelles and the "entrepreneurs" who lead them.  In the third installment, the all too predictable Ghost of Christmas Future, delves into the horrible underlying, real-life story behind start ups and gazelles and how (if) a young and promising economic developer can hitch them up to his/her community revitalization. The issue ends with the usual and dismal Curmudgeon blather on the New Truism, but ends optimistically by offering  a few suggestions on how a sub-state economic developer can actually use some of this Think Tank babble. And you thought Christmas was over and done with! How wrong you are.

NEXT MONTH: BUSINESS CLIMATES AS AN ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT STRATEGY

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