STARTING A NEW BUSINESS IN THE EU--OR NOT

Every talking head in the United States is screaming about how bad our economy is. Most of them are describing in excruciating detail all the many ways it's going to get worse. That may be but it cannot completely douse the American enterprise spirit. We are still starting, and to some extent, succeeding at small businesses.

On the other hand our allies in United Kingdom are basically not. Surely there are some people who would like to but they face two almost insurmountable problems. There is currently no economic growth to give a new business a bump or with which to identify new demand. Worse, because all of bank reserves must be held back to bail out first Greece, then almost certainly Portugal (likely followed by Ireland which is no picnic). So an ambitious Brit could have all the energy in the world and a great business concept. He cannot get a loan because there is no money to loan.

This fun of course leads to the likelihood that, because of the absence of enterprise, there will be no economic growth. Where is no economic growth there might not be enough money to bail out three major countries and your odd Iceland.

I write all this not to call in to question the whole idea of the European Union but to remind us that being in United States of America is, at least comparatively, not such a bad thing.