Economics

Editor’s note: As a follow-up to the venerable Rick Franza’s 2024 prediction outcome article, we wanted to ensure you didn’t miss what he believes will impact your business in the coming year. Grab some libation and dive into 2025! After wrapping up my grading for 2024 (both for my Augusta University/Hull College students and for my 2024 Predictions for the Augusta Business Daily), I am sitting on an oceanfront balcony on Hilton Head Island contemplating the year ahead. Unlike last year, when my prognostications spanned multiple areas (national economy, local

The start-up business world is coming to Augusta later in 2025. Until then, leaders at Make Startups are visiting start-up incubators all over the country. It has been almost a year since ABD first told you about a local entrepreneurial group getting ready to crisscross America to learn and share best practices. Make Startups is based in theClubhou.se and is an offshoot of HACK Augusta. It is in the Georgia Cyber Innovation and Training Center. Eric Parker, CEO of Make Startups, told ABD they have been visiting from the West

Economics has always been interested in what creates wealth ever since Adam Smith wrote An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations. Many of my columns for Augusta Business Daily have examined the nature and causes of the wealth of the Augusta Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA). Recent research on economic freedom across all MSAs in the US sheds some light on which MSAs are growing the fastest and creating the most wealth. Dean Stansel of the Birdwell Institute, has been compiling an index of economic freedom

After wrapping up my grading for 2024 (both for my Augusta University/Hull College students and for my 2024 Predictions for the Augusta Business Daily), I am sitting on an oceanfront balcony on Hilton Head Island contemplating the year ahead. Unlike last year, when my prognostications spanned multiple areas (national economy, local economy, workplace trends, and the business of sports), this year, the scope of my predictions will be more limited. Given the election of Donald J. Trump as our President, I thought I would tackle predicting how President Trump might

Last week, I documented the initial impact of Hurricane Helene on the labor market. This week, I provide some thoughts on the long-term impacts on our health based on my reading of the academic literature. Rachel Young and Solomon Hsiang provide the first evidence of the long-term effect of tropical storms in an article in Nature. They find that mortality increases by 3.2% to 5.1% over 15 years following a hurricane. In Augusta, using all-cause mortality rates for Georgia, this would mean an extra 194 to 309 deaths per year,