Back in what seems now like a past life, mainstream physics and I went separate ways. Official physicists wanted to forget the charge and mass from protons and electrons so they could have this mysterious electromagnetic wavicle called light transmitted particle-to-particle. I requested the physicists let the particles retain their charge and mass as postulated and let the EM do its thing in a nineteenth-century paradigm. That was pish-posh because it made so much more sense to the powers that were to create a mystery and ignore the unintended mystery needed to explain why the physical universe dropped dead to let the first bear sway.

Yes, Virginia, there is an economic parallel.

Today, the Carolina Journal published an article by Barry Smith about the state reforming the way it does economic development. It sounds like no more than rearranging the bureaucracy. To me, economic development is the practice of government jumping in front of businesses asking, “Where are you going for I am your leader?” and shelling out taxpayer dollars. Anyhoo, a couple comments in Smith’s article stood out:

“We want folks that are getting the job done to be rewarded for doing that, and those who don’t … not be rewarded,” said department spokesman Josh Ellis.

Brent Lane, director of the Carolina Center for Competitive Economies at the Kenan-Flagler Business School at UNC-Chapel Hill, said it has been difficult for Commerce to hang on to its talent. “We need to be able to reward high-performing economic developers,” Lane said. “Otherwise, what are they going to do?”

Another Lesleeism suggests communities do not prosper from people sitting around the table planning how to make it happen, but from people going out and making more and better stuff. That said, I chortle at government searching for a way to reward those who advance the economy. It’s called money. It’s been around a long time, and it worked really well until government started taking it away from the high performers to give to the low performers so they could brainstorm ways to get it back to the high performers.