Delaware Business Blog

The Delaware Business Weekly Round Up is designed to bring you some quick links to news headlines and press releases from companies based in Delaware and issues impacting business the State of Delaware. Here’s our edition for January 21st, 2012 through January 27th, 2012:
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In a nutshell- the plan invests in jobs and public education, keeps the state’s commitment to critical areas like public health and safety and balances without the need to raise taxes or add new fees. If you roll up your sleeves you can find that the Fiscal Year 2013 Operating Budget and Capital Improvements Act fully funds the state’s Rainy Day Fund, adheres to the state’s three-part debt limit, seeks to maintain the state’s AAA bond rating and appropriates only 98% of available revenue.

Sound pretty good? Judge for yourself by checking out the actual power point of the proposal online:

Markell FY’13 Budget Proposal (PDF)

Today the Office of Advocacy released the annual Small Business Profiles for the States and Territories. This is the 16th year Advocacy has published a state-by-state profile of American small business for all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and U.S. territories. The profiles are an invaluable resource for small businesses, legislators, academics, government officials, and policymakers in each state. The Delaware profile uses the most recent data available to provide details about the state’s small business employment; business starts and closings; bank lending; business ownership by minorities, women, and veterans; and firm and employment change by major industry and firm size.

“Small businesses are the foundation of economic growth in Delaware and in our nation” said Dr. Winslow Sargeant, Chief Counsel for Advocacy. “By supporting policies that promote innovation and entrepreneurship, we help small businesses tackle these challenging economic times. These statistics are a resource for a path to economic growth.”

http://www.delawarebusinessblog.com/?p=3879&preview=true

Here are some highlights from Delaware’s small business profile:
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In a time where the banking industry has been less reliable than Americans have seen in many years, is it possible to buy stability? More importantly, can Delaware businesses and citizens afford the price tag? In Delaware, the legislature spent the summer trying to raise the money to do just that. A few of the papers were among the first to condemn the lawmakers for taxing the local communities to raise the capital necessary to attract corporations like Amazon.com. The Amazon.com relocation will provide more corporate diversity in the industry mix for a state that has been closely identified with the banking industry’s lending arm. The diversity can provide the peace of mind to small business owners looking to base their plans for the future on more than one industry, and feel confident that a ripple in one industry won’t send them down the same slide because they rely on that industry so heavily.

Just because the government builds it doesn’t guarantee they will come – or worse, it doesn’t guarantee they will stay. In a recent article by David Mildenberg for Bloomberg News, he explains why the creation of the right environment is only part of the equation. He goes on to explain that even if Delaware officials get a big company on the hook, it doesn’t mean that they’ll be able to keep it. The city of Wichita spent $43 million on a training center for aerospace workers, and Boeing still decided to close its facility employing over 2100 employees. States like Illinois, New Jersey, Texas and Oklahoma are not only investing in the right packages to attract new corporations, but also in the right packages to keep them once they are settled in. What does this spell for Delaware?
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