OPINION
4A
THE DAILY ASTORIAN • FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 29, 2017
Founded in 1873
DAVID F. PERO, Publisher & Editor
JIM VAN NOSTRAND, Managing Editor
JEREMY FELDMAN, Circulation Manager
DEBRA BLOOM, Business Manager
JOHN D. BRUIJN, Production Manager
CARL EARL, Systems Manager
OUR VIEW
E
ach week we recognize those people and organizations
in the community deserving of public praise for the good
things they do to make the North Coast a better place to
live, and also those who should be called out for their actions.
SHOUTOUTS
• Dr. William Armington, Willis Van Dusen, Michael Autio
and Randy McClelland, who were each honored recently by the
Columbia Memorial Hospital Foundation. Armington received
the foundation’s first-ever Caduceus Award, which recognizes a
physician or provider who has gone above and beyond to advance
philanthropy at CMH and in the community. Van Dusen, a long-
time mayor of Astoria and community leader who led the fund-
raising for the new cancer center, was honored with the Terry
Award, which recognizes a volunteer for advancing philanthropy
at CMH and in the community. Autio, last year’s Terry Award
recipient and immediate past chairman of the foundation, received
the new Columbia Award. Autio has been actively involved with
the foundation and hospital for more than 22 years. McClelland,
director of CMH’s strategic initiatives department, received the
President’s Award. The honor is named for the hospital’s current
president and CEO, Erik Thorsen, and recognized McClelland for
his work in coordinating the artwork in the new Knight Cancer
Collaborative.
• Ryan Snyder, president of Martin North hospitality com-
pany, who organized
last weekend’s inaugu-
ral ’Stackstock Music
Fest in Cannon Beach.
The outdoor event, held
at Haystack Gardens,
drew about 600 people
and included an eight-
Erick Bengel/The Daily Astorian
hour concert featuring five
The OK Chorale PDX — represented prominent Portland-area
here by, from left, Cardioid’s Lizzy
Ellison, Pure Bathing Culture’s Zach bands and was headlined
Tillman and Wonderly’s Jim Brun- by Colin Meloy, the front-
berg — play “Purple Rain.”
man of The Decemberists.
Attendees described the
event as “relaxed,” “intimate” and “breezy.” Snyder said some of
the proceeds from the festival will be used to start a local music
scholarship.
• The hundreds of local volunteers who participated in the
annual SOLVE Beach and Riverside Cleanup last weekend in
Gearhart, Seaside and Cannon Beach to remove trash and debris.
Statewide, volunteers picked up more than 72,000 pounds of trash
from 140 project sites along all 362 miles of Oregon’s coastline.
Common items found were cigarette butts, fishing rope, glass
and plastic bottles and other plastic items. In Gearhart, the debris
included a car exhaust pipe.
• Astoria Downtown Historic District Association organiz-
ers and the hundreds of volunteers who planned and staged the
16th annual Pacific Northwest Brew Cup festival last weekend
by the riverfront. The three-day event was family friendly and fea-
tured craft brews from more than 40 brewers from the Northwest
and California, along with live music, food and fun and games for
children.
• Neil Branson, director of the 28th annual 3-Course
Challenge, a grueling cross-country meet that is hosted by Seaside
High School each year at Camp Rilea. Last weekend’s meet fea-
tured 2,107 runners from 77 high schools, 22 middle schools and
two running clubs who finished the course. Teams came from as far
away as Southern California and British Columbia. Branson retired
last year as the Gulls longtime cross-country coach, but is continu-
ing his association with running as the meet’s organizer and director.
• Conductor John Buehler and the Cannon Beach Chorus,
which is celebrating its 30th anniversary this year. The community
choir has more than 60 members from all walks of life across the
North Coast ranging from high-school age to more than 80-years-
old. The chorus performs regularly throughout the community.
Buehler has been the conductor since 2010 and said in honor of
the anniversary the chorus will have a piece commissioned espe-
cially for them to premiere next spring.
CALLOUTS
• The state Department of Revenue, which despite being told
to improve and increase debt collection five months ago, still can’t
say if it’s worked. As of mid-2016, the state was owed about $3.3
billion and in April Gov. Kate Brown ordered the department to
step up efforts. Audits have revealed a number of issues at the
agency during the past decade. While the department says it has
initiated new programs, has increased collection efforts and has
been recruiting and filling vacant positions, it’s still too early to
judge the impact of those efforts.
Suggestions?
Do you have a Shoutout or Callout you think we should know about? Let
us know at news@dailyastorian.com and we’ll make sure to take a look.
Creative Commons
Are entrepreneurs a dying breed?
By ROBERT J. SAMUELSON
Washington Post Writers Group
W
ASHINGTON — Maybe
we’re not “’Shark Tank’
nation” after all. The
incredibly popular
cable business
program, which
features budding
entrepreneurs
pleading for back-
ing from wealthy
investors (the
“sharks”), seems to define us. We’re
a nation of hungry go-getters, eager
to start our own business on the
way to becoming multimillionaires.
Everyone wants to strike it big.
There’s a huge gap between
perception and reality. Just recently,
the Census Bureau released its latest
figures for business startups, and they
paint a picture strikingly at odds with
the conventional wisdom. Instead of
a boom in business startups, there’s
been a long-term decline. In 2015,
startups totaled 414,000, “well below
the pre-Great Recession average of
524,000 startup firms,” as Census
puts it.
To be sure, the slump reflects
the lingering adverse effects of the
recession. Venture capital firms,
which provide funds for new busi-
nesses, “are more risk averse,” says
economist Robert Litan. But that’s
not the whole story. A 2014 study by
Litan and Ian Hathaway found that
the startup decline dates back to at
least the late 1970s, affects all major
industries and has been present in
365 out of 366 metropolitan areas.
What’s going on?
The answer is important not
only because it alters our national
self-image but also because it affects
the economy’s job-creation capacity.
Business startups are constantly
priming the employment pump
with new jobs. If startups continue
to decline, overall job creation may
suffer.
‘Entrepreneurs need three
things: great new ideas; the
talent and money to pursue
them; and few distractions.’
John Dearie
head of the Center for American Entrepreneurship, a newly formed advocacy group
Take 2015 — the subject of the
Census report — as a case in point.
Net job creation totaled 3.1 million,
Census says. But that figure emerged
from a more confusing process:
the addition of 16.8 million jobs
minus the loss of 13.7 million jobs.
Moreover, of the 3.1 million new
jobs, roughly four-fifths (2.5 million)
were created by startups, Census
reports.
As these numbers indicate, many
companies were hiring and firing.
But the two often canceled each out.
Consider companies aged 1 to 5
years old. In 2015, they created 2.11
million new jobs and lost 2.32 mil-
lion jobs, for a net loss of 212,000.
Without the impetus provided by
startup jobs, total employment
growth might have been much
slower.
Although we tend to think of
startups as high-tech — the next
Google or Facebook — most new
firms are more mundane: plumbers,
electricians, restaurants and the like.
The breadth of the startup slowdown
suggests that the underlying causes
do not apply to just one industry or
company age. Still, there is no agree-
ment as to causes.
Slower population growth is
one pressure, says Litan. Cities and
regions are expanding less rapidly
than in the past and don’t need as
many new hairdressers, construction
companies, health clubs and doctors’
offices. Regions dominated by a
few big employers may also have
fewer startups. People lack a “startup
culture,” says Litan. They depend too
much on the mega-employer.
Growing market power of exist-
ing firms is a newer theory. “You’ve
got rising market power,” Marshall
Steinbaum, an economist from the
left-leaning Roosevelt Institute, told
The New York Times. “In general,
that makes it hard for new businesses
to compete with incumbents.” This
has long been true, but in the past,
it hasn’t prevented startups from
displacing powerful industry leaders.
(See, for example, Microsoft and
IBM.)
Still others argue that entrepre-
neurship is being strangled by hostile
government policies. “Entrepreneurs
need three things: great new ideas;
the talent and money to pursue
them; and few distractions,” says
John Dearie, head of the Center for
American Entrepreneurship, a newly
formed advocacy group.
Government, he argues, frustrates
all three. Federal research and devel-
opment, as a share of the economy,
is less than half its post-World War
peak, stifling new ideas. Immigration
policy keeps out talented workers;
and complex regulations and taxes
distract entrepreneurs from their
businesses.
“Shark Tank” rests on the premise
that the dream of starting your own
business and getting rich through
hard work and satisfying some mar-
ket demand is still thriving. Many
candidates on the program fit that
mold. They’re passionate about their
products. But the evidence from the
outside world suggests a more som-
ber question: Are they a dying breed?
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