By exempting internet retailers like Amazon.com from collecting sales taxes, lawmakers provide a substantial financial incentive for people to bypass local businesses and shop online instead. … Read More
As we start down the path of breaking up with the big banks and defending our own economic interests and that of our communities, we should think about the whole range of financial services we use. We need to give thought to both the saving and lending sides of a bank. Each is crucial. On the savings side, community-based financial institutions need our deposits much more than the big banks do. But to be profitable community banks need to convert those deposits into loans. … Read More
More holiday shoppers deliberately sought out locally owned businesses this year, according to a national survey of more than 1,800 independent businesses.… Read More
Hearings held to investigate the crash of 1929 led to the passage of the Glass-Steagall Act, which fundamentally restructured the banking industry. Can the FCIC hearings, which get underway today, help to bring it back? … Read More
Despite growing public support, local businesses are likely to remain on the economic margins without fundamental changes in public policy. In this lecture, delivered at the Bristol Schumacher Conference in Great Britain, Stacy Mitchell proposes a set of new rules — policies that would foster local self-reliance and refashion the economy for long-term viability.
Big-Box Swindle was named one of the top ten business books of the year by Booklist and described by Bill McKibben as “the ultimate account of the single most important economic trend in our country.”… Read More
A survey of over 100 independent retailers in New England has found that almost all would like to source more of their inventory from local and regional producers, but there are barriers to doing so, including, most notably, a lack of an easy and efficient way for retailers to identify New England companies manufacturing the kinds of goods they carry.… Read More
Current providers won’t encourage the competition necessary to improve service and cut costs.
Last January, as the economy spiraled downward, Time Warner did what no other company could have gotten away with under the circumstances: It imposed a price increase of as much as 5.5 percent on its Maine customers.
Meanwhile, the state’s other major broadband Internet provider, FairPoint, has amassed a stunning track record of mismanagement and abysmal customer service.
