Small Business | Michael R Lewis, ASJA

May 16, 2014January 3, 2024

5 Reasons Now Is The Best Time to Start a New Business

The combination of inexpensive technology, accessible virtual markets, and easy funding through crowdsourcing is changing the face of entrepreneurship. Today’s new business starters are socially sophisticated, willing to bear more risk than previous generations, and more likely to work out of a home or small office and rely on others for business processes. Some are small guerrilla outfits surfing from one hot concept to the next, and some are venture capital-funded geniuses with disruptor ideas.
It is a great time to start a new business – the best time in history.

The Keys to Success

America has always been the land of opportunity, the Mecca for entrepreneurship. While great fortunes have been made by immigrants and first-generation Americans such as Andrew Carnegie in steel, John D. Rockefeller in oil, and William A. Clark in copper, thousands of others formed successful small companies that provided financial security and employment for hundreds of thousands of their fellow citizens.

The possibility of being responsible for one’s own fate has never been greater in the history of the country. Latent opportunities for new ideas and businesses have exploded exponentially, each new concept and novel interpretation of old methods pregnant with possibility, just waiting to be birthed. There are several key reasons why this is so.

1. Cultural Accommodation

For much of history, capitalism was restricted to the beneficiaries of high birth, ancestral wealth, and exclusive education. The wide-open spaces and untapped resources of the new continent in the 19th century shattered cultural norms that had existed for hundreds of years. Entrepreneurs flooded the country, exploiting new resources, new markets, and new technology to create the greatest industrial nation in the history of the world.

Despite the success, access to these new possibilities was unfortunately generally limited to white males. Minorities (except in their limited communities) and women were excluded, restricted by racial prejudice, cultural stereotypes, and inefficient educations.
America in the 21st century is a more open society and access continues to broaden regardless of sex or ethnicity – anyone smart enough and brave enough to create a new business can try. According to a 2013 American Express report, there are 8.6 million women-owned businesses in the country, generating more than $1.3 trillion in revenues and providing jobs for 7.8 million employees. The rate of growth between 1997 and 2013 in new women-owned businesses has been one and a half times the national average. In a U.S. Census News release in 2011, Tom Mesenbourg, deputy director of the U.S. Census Bureau, proclaimed, “The growth in the number of minority-owned firms – both employers and non-employers – has far outpaced that of businesses overall.”

Led by federal and state governments, programs to assist potential new business owners are readily accessible and generally free. An entrepreneur can access classes ranging from basic accounting, to sophisticated product and service contracting. Face-to-face onsite mentoring is available from organizations such as S.C.O.R.E., while municipalities, colleges and universities, and private businesses offer incubator facilities with administrative and accounting assistance at low cost. Federal laws require that a percentage of federal contracts be subcontracted to small businesses and provide detailed contracting assistance for those individuals and companies who seek such work.

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April 15, 2014January 3, 2024

Understanding the Impact of a Federal Minimum Wage Increase

On February 11, 2014, President Barack Obama signed an executive order raising the minimum pay for workers employed by companies that have federal contracts. The pay per hour would be lifted from $7.25 to $10.10 and go into effect on January 1, 2015.

As might be expected, the move ignited a fire storm of dueling statistics and questionable conclusions from both sides of the political spectrum. Consequently, the average American is likely confused about who the order affects and its potential impact on the economy.

The Driver for Change: Income Inequality in America

The words “income inequality” presuppose that the current distribution of income between various levels of the population is unfair, a conclusion both supported and contested by many. The facts are that an increasing share of pre-tax cash market income – such as wages and salaries, dividends, interest, rent, investment returns, and business profits – has gone to the top 1% of Americans, while the share of the bottom 90% has fallen since the mid- to late-1970s. According to figures compiled by Emmanuel Saez, economics professor at UC-Berkely, the top 1% received around 22.5% of all pretax income while the bottom 90% dropped below a 50% share for the first time in history.

Whether or not this represents a problem depends upon your perspective and political leanings. According to a Pew Research Factank report from December 2013, 61% of Democrats and 50% of independents said the gap was a big problem – versus only 28% of Republicans.

In 2012, former partner at Bain Capital and author of “Unintended Consequences: Why Everything You’ve Been Told About the Economy is Wrong,” Edward Conard, aggressively argued that the enormous and growing income inequality was a sign that the U.S. economy was working, and, if we had a little more inequality, everyone – particularly the 99% – would be better off. According to the New York Times, Conard is not only a member of top 1%, he is a member of the top 0.1%, with an estimated wealth of hundreds of millions of dollars. Are Mr. Conard and his 1% cohorts just protecting their assets as their opponents claim, or do they have the solution for a better America?

On the other side of the issue, Nobel laureate economist Joseph E. Stiglitz claims in his book “The Price of Inequality” that rising inequality is putting a brake on growth and promoting economic instability. British epidemiologists Kate E. Pickett and Richard G. Wilkinson, writing in “The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better,” go even further to claim that income inequality undermines social bonds, contributes to mental illness, and increases obesity and teenage pregnancy while fostering crime and lowering life expectancy. Conservatives claim such opinions are akin to Chicken Little’s hysteria that the sky is falling – but what if they’re right?

A third perspective on income inequality was presented in a 2013 Forbes article by Shah Gilani, a hedge fund manager and a former manager of the futures and options division of Lloyd’s Bank. Gilani proposes that the tax code should be revamped and simplified while improving educational opportunities and skill-based opportunities for the middle class. He argues that the middle class are the real victims of inequality, and if not helped they “will increasingly slip into poverty and the backbone of America’s increasingly brittle skeleton will turn to dust.”

How to Start Urban Beekeeping – The Importance of Honey Bees

The bee has always occupied a special place in man’s psyche. Young children learn the origins of babies with stories of “the birds and the bees,” while their industry is so respected that a person engaged in intense activity is “as busy as a bee.” “Spelling bees” and “quilting bees” are so named because a meeting of people working together resembles the scenes within a beehive. Closely guarded information is “none of your beeswax,” and the flappers of the 1920s popularized the “bee’s knees” to express the coolness of an object or activity.We have seen girls with “bee-stung lips,” and refer to irritated people as having a “bee in their bonnet.” And who hasn’t made a “beeline” for a special object?

As far as we know, bees have been around for about 125 million years. They are descendants of wasps, most of which are predator carnivores. Bees, however, switched from hunting prey to collecting pollen for food – a nice adaptation, since the food doesn’t fight back. Scientists have since classified nearly 20,000 species of bees, and they are found on every continent except Antarctica. They are the most efficient pollination agents in nature, a critical factor in the appearance of the world as we know it.

Seizing Opportunities in the Mortgage Industry and the Missteps to Avoid

This article initially appeared in National Mortgage Professional.com on March 13, 2014.

From time to time, fundamental shifts occur in all markets, upending the traditional roles of industry players and besetting them with new opportunities and risks. These shifts may be the consequence of technology, government regulation, economic exuberance or deflation or a combination of factors. Whatever the cause, however, old ways of doing business are threatened and new industry leaders emerge. Now is one of those times in the mortgage banking and brokerage industries. Success as the playing field changes is not guaranteed. Strategic missteps can lead to loss, even liquidation. The rewards, however, may be great for those who see the future, move forcefully to implement a winning strategy, and consolidate their gains as they proceed.

The right time and opportunity

Following the 2008 implosion of the mortgage-backed security market and the subsequent international recession, housing prices dropped by almost a third, and the stock market as measured by the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) fell to 6,469 on March 6, 2009, less than half its previous value of 14,164 on Oct. 9, 2007. As a consequence, a number of investment and commercial banks failed (Lehman Brothers and Washington Mutual), some were forced into involuntary mergers (Bear Stearns and Merrill Lynch), and some were bailed out by the federal government (Goldman Sachs). Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were placed into receivership while Congress initiated the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 followed by the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act in 2010 to aggressively regulate mortgage and commercial bank activities.