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ECONOMIC ANALYSIS: China’s economic engine may be starting to sputter

It seemed like a reasonable forecast at the time. After an extraordinarily violent and deadly hurricane season in 2005, predictions of a second straight severe summer in 2006 made big headlines. But 2006 has turned out to be a year where not a single hurricane-rated storm has made U.S. landfall, one of only 21 years on record here that has been hurricane-free. It’s hardly the first time forecasters have eaten humble pie. And the experience serves to remind us that…

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Dixie Chopper survives declining mower market: Zero-turning-radius pioneer rebounds with new units

This year was not kind to Dixie Chopper, the company near Greencastle known for making the “world’s fastest lawn mower.” Selling season is over, and Dixie Chopper sold 12,000 mowers, 3,000 fewer than forecasted. But company founder Art Evans said 2006 wasn’t as bad as rumored in the industry. “We’re not going bankrupt, we’re not upside down financially, and we’re not being bought out,” Evans said. Dixie Chopper laid off 10 to 15 employees, temporarily cut its workweek from 40…

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FUNNY BUSINESS: Being your own boss doesn’t save you from idiots

I work at home. Well, I call it work, but really it’s just sitting around making fun of things. Which is the same “job” description I used when I “worked” (boy, this is going to date me) at what used to be known as The Daily Newspaper. Nowadays, it’s The Manually Delivered User Operated Lifestyle Enhancement Information Platform. Anyway, the good thing about doing whatever I do at home is that I’m free from the tyrannies of the workplace-meetings, idiot…

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INVESTING: Investing opportunities remain, but pick your spots

Only about a month and a half is left in the year. It feels as though under-invested managers are pushing to make things happen so they can catch up to the market. Today, we are going to get into where the strength should be the rest of the year, and some of it is coming from unsuspecting places. We’ll also look at what should be avoided. It won’t come as any surprise where the weakness lies. The markets have been…

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NOTIONS: A call for cooperation in a deep purple nation

It’s election night. The hour is late. Political junkie that I am, however, I’m propped up in bed, the television blaring before me, the laptop perched on my legs. Remote in hand, I flip TV channels between CNN, NBC, ABC, CBS, MSNBC, CNBC, FOX, C- SPAN and Comedy Central. With the flick of an index finger on my computer, I bounce between Web sites of The Indianapolis Star, The New York Times, The Washington Post, the Marion County Election Board,…

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BULLS & BEARS: Aging investors won’t lose taste for stocks

A popular theory is swirling around the investment community. It posits that in a few years stock markets will fall because of selling by the baby boomers. The theorists believe the baby boomers will become increasingly conservative with their savings, selling stocks to buy bonds and other income-producing investments. From my experience, this is a load of hooey. I’m guessing the theorists are in academia and not actually doing investment management with real people. The firm I co-founded manages investment…

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Techies push for education initiatives: Daniels administration trying to heed call to build a better-equipped work force with ‘Accelerating Growth’ plan

The numbers are daunting. According to Gov. Mitch Daniels’ economic development plan “Accelerating Growth,” Indiana ranks 35th out of 50 states for the proportion of its population with at least an associate’s degree. Worse, it ranks 47th for bachelor’s degrees. A full million Hoosiers “lack the basic skills necessary for 21st century employment,” according to the plan. That’s about a sixth of the state’s population. High-tech leaders are increasingly focused on reversing the trend. They know the availability of a…

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Techpoint’s new leader sees room to grow: Indiana making progress, but could do better, he says

Techpoint, a locally based technology trade group that represents the interests of about 330 members statewide, is undergoing a transition in leadership. Jim Jay, 37, has been named interim CEO following the resignation of Cameron Carter, who has led the organization since 2003. Directors should begin a formal search for a permanent replacement the first of the year. Whether Jay lands the top job remains to be seen. But in the meantime, the Butler University graduate with an entrepreneurial spirit…

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ECONOMIC ANALYSIS: Our technology woes begin in grade school

Those of us who work for universities soon become acquainted with the concept of tenure, which is a status typically conferred upon those of faculty rank who have demonstrated to their colleagues the ability to teach and conduct research to a high standard. Those who achieve tenured status are more free to speak their minds about controversial issues, since it is much more difficult for their superiors to terminate or dismiss them without just cause. The words penned in this…

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BULLS & BEARS: Market may be at high, but big challenges loom

The other day, as investors basked in the glow of new stock market highs, an eyecatching headline traveled across newswires. The article, which seemed out of place with the record highs on the Dow Jones industrial average, was titled “GAO chief warns economic disaster looms.” The Government Accountability Office, or GAO, is an investigative arm of Congress that audits and evaluates the performance of the federal government. The head of the GAO can be thought of as the nation’s chief…

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ECONOMIC ANALYSIS: Improving state economy defies simple measures

The replacement of the Indiana Department of Commerce with the privately directed Indiana Economic Development Corp. has been mostly a non-issue in this election season. While most of the fist-pounding, face-reddening rhetoric has been directed at such meaty issues as how long we wait when we go to the BMV office once a year and whether or not we should reset our clocks each spring and fall, the issue of how we go about reinventing and reinvigorating the economy that…

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VOICES FROM THE INDUSTRY: High gasoline prices sometimes difficult to understand

Just who or what is it that sets the price for a gallon of gas? Well, gasoline station owners of course. Whether it’s a momand-pop station or part of a large chain, the owner looks at prices up and down the street and changes the signs accordingly. These owners know what everybody else around them is charging, and they also know what their supplier is charging them for their wholesale supply. What about the wholesale price? Its set in a…

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ECONOMIC ANALYSIS: It’s time to get realistic about the federal deficit

Most of us know that the dollar figures used to describe the national economy are awfully large. That includes the dollar totals that pertain to the operations of the federal government as well. We’re a big country, with a population nearly 300 million strong. We have the world’s largest economy, and, yes, the world’s largest government. And every newly elected congressman or congresswoman soon gets comfortable tossing around multibillion-dollar spending commitments as if they were salt and pepper shakers at…

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NOTIONS: Dear philanthropist: Make me a daydream believer

Last month, I picked up my boys in Fort Wayne, drove north on Interstate 69, hooked a left at Interstate 94, and got off at the Portage, Mich., exit. There, we whiled away the weekend at a family reunion. The grownups ate too much, caught up on gossip and puttered around the lake in the speedboat. The teenagers, whom we rarely saw, did X-Box battle in the basement. On Sunday, after the kids had surfaced for lunch and the grandparents…

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Fewer businesses splurging for employee relocation costs: Perk is more prevalent, though, when attempting to attract high-level executives

Paying closing costs on a home or, better yet, asking that a potential employer purchase the house itself are among the brashest requests she’s fielded. Yet the owner of Quiring Associates Inc. expressed some surprise when the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota arranged to move her daughter, a recent Purdue University graduate embarking on her first job no less. “They brought a huge van down to pick up her things,” Quiring said. “They actually wanted her to know how serious they…

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Office furniture dealers experience sales rebound: Better economy, more moves give industry a boost

Indianapolis-area office furniture dealers are awash with business, following a robust national trend that has lifted the industry beyond its lows of a few years ago. As businesses have begun to move into bigger quarters since 2003, they’ve naturally ordered desks, chairs and filing cabinets to fill the bigger space, local dealers said. “The industry is closer to where it used to be, but I don’t think we’ll ever again see the kind of activity we had in the mid-…

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DIFFERENT TAKES: IS IT IMPORTANT FOR COMPANIES TO STAY LOCAL?

Mergers not only good for investors Keeping local roots is high priority DIFFERENT TAKES IS IT IMPORTANT FOR COMPANIES TO STAY LOCAL? When entrepreneurs or investors start companies, they do so with a goal in mind. That goal might be to create jobs, create value for investors or shareholders, develop local talent, build long-term capabilities for the company and the state’s economy, produce a profit, or all of these. Chances of success rise as we embrace the idea of an…

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Housing bubble on hold

The inventory of central Indiana homes for sale is piling up, but the backlog so far hasn’t caused prices to fall, according to experts and industry statistics.

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ECONOMIC ANALYSIS: Does the economy care who wins in November?

If you ever visit Indiana’s past through the eyes of our state’s excellent historians, you uncover many amazing facts. To me, one of the most remarkable is this: In the 19th century, before the age of the automobile, mass communication and high school basketball, the voter turnout among Hoosiers in national elections approached, and sometimes surpassed, 90 percent. When you think about the sacrifice it took to get to a polling place in those days, that’s an incredible achievement. Of…

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Volatile markets aren’t as whacky as they seem:

Even in a going-nowhere year like 2006, the ups and downs of the financial markets strike a lot of people as too much. Stock prices, in particular, are constantly described as volatile-swinging in arcs far wider than economic conditions could possibly warrant. Look at emerging markets stocks, which jumped 25 percent in the first few months of this year, then gave the whole gain back again in less than six weeks. These stocks from economies on the frontiers of capitalism,…

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