DECLINE IS A CHOICE: Colorado has fallen behind in economic growth.

Up until recently, Arizona and Colorado had remarkably similar economies, with Colorado having a slight edge — from state GDP and growth trajectories to population and jobs. But something happened in Colorado around five years ago that set us on a different course. For the first time since the Great Recession, Arizona’s economy now outpaces Colorado’s, even when factoring in the impacts of the pandemic.

According to the Arizona chamber’s report, the shift in tide came after Colorado’s 2019 state legislative session, which sparked the rapid onset of new mandates, costs and regulatory burdens on the business community. As the report’s joint authors at the Common Sense Institute said, “the lesson of Colorado’s anti-business policy transformation over the past half decade shows that climates can change quickly.”

Since 2019, Colorado’s annual job growth slowed by more than 60%. Sectors that are sensitive to governmental regulation, such as manufacturing and energy resources, have been declining.

Most of the job growth we have experienced has been found in professional business services — an area that (not coincidentally) assists with regulatory compliance through human resources, accounting, and legal support.

Political pull and “regulatory compliance” assistance are the big growth industries wherever big government dominates. All three are classes of parasites.