Regional Strategic, Ltd.

Had a great time at the National Balloon Classic in Indianola, Iowa last night. Regional Strategic, Ltd. helped the balloon classic with an economic impact study in 2023. Luckily, we are better economists than we are photographers.

Don't be data driven. Be data informed. There is not a data string in the world I would default to for decisions. There are a lot of data strings I would review before making a decision.

My years at the university garnered a lot of tools I utilize in market research, economic impact analysis, business planning, and pro forma analysis: economics, accounting, statistics. Tools that help define and present answers. Learning to ask the right questions, however, started in a multiple-business family. We had a small truck line, a livestock brokerage, and a farm. Even when we played, we were often in the truck shop or the stockyards. Chores made us part of the business. It has proven invaluable. https://lnkd.in/eWTjYAyS

We do a steady stream of economic impact analysis projects at Regional Strategic, Ltd. Here is a brief accessible note on some of the characteristics and constraints of an analysis based on an Input-Output model. You don't have to be an economist or mathematician to understand the environment, but you do need to understand a few basic ground rules. https://lnkd.in/g9wJs-jP

All human progress depends upon changing minds – first your own and then those around you. Changing minds is a function of carrots rather than a function of sticks. Whenever we dig our heals in and refuse to compromise, we stop progress.

DATA IN CONTEXT: We all talk about employment and quote statistics on a regular basis, but few of us even imagine the complexity of the employment data out there or the substantial differences between sources. About 20 years ago, I wrote the original version of the linked narrative to assist students and researchers engaged in regional analysis work. Its first home was the Department of Economics website at Iowa State University. When I left the department in 2007, the document stagnated due to a lack of updates. I recently stumbled across the original text and decided it would still serve a purpose if updated. Here is the update.

Staying off the brakes can drive more change.

This from Statista. Surf carefully out there. "As the annual Imperva Bad Bot Report shows, almost half of all traffic is related to bot activity, with one third of the overall global traffic being connected to malicious programs. These programs are used in a wide variety of situations. For example, scalpers use bots to buy up limited edition items like footwear or electronics, while other bad actors use programs for Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks, taking down specific websites by overloading their servers. Around 18 percent of bot traffic can be traced back to benign usage like search engine crawlers indexing the web."