Not that I actually know anything about economics - only the ups and downs that I see in the bank account. When I was an undergrad at UCI back in the 90's, I signed up for an economics class but dropped after the first week - too busy I thought. As if working 20 hours per week & taking 4 classes per quarter added up to busy - now that would seem like a cake walk.
Note to self: someday take a basic business economics class! It would be so damn helpful. That being said, we've made it as a small startup for over 3 years now - without siphoning much money out of the pockets of well-meaning relatives. It's called the art of boot-strapping, but it doesn't leave much left over for normal business expenses like website design, advertising, marketing, PR.
The only reason I bring up the economy at all is that the news just keeps getting worse. Everywhere you turn, a headline screams about how the economy is tanking. I wonder how much of this is really happening in a structural way and how much of this is just over-reaction to all of the bad news. Housing prices are down, people are foreclosing, no one is spending money - at least that's what the news leads us to believe. So as a small business owner, how do I forecast and plan for this year? People still have to eat, right? People still celebrate birthdays with cake, right? An article in the Register this morning said that restaurants are down compared to 2 years ago. Maybe I should just stop reading the paper because all this bad news makes me feel paranoid and helpless.
Those of us old enough to remember the dot.com bubble burst have seen this before... Good news, great news, stocks up then the big psychological crash, then bad news and more bad news. Maybe I'll use the ostrich approach and put my head in the sand, confident that this will pass...
And in the meantime, we still get to make cake, croissants, bread pudding and marshmallows and keep my fingers crossed.
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