The recent editorial on making Maine a better place to do business was spot on and a breath of fresh air (“Our View: Maine needs to get down to business,” July 28).

It has been common knowledge for years that Maine’s businesses struggle to compete with those from other states. We have higher taxes, energy and health care costs. Our workforce is aging and we have a very low percentage of young people. A recent study revealed that we’re getting about one-tenth of the national average of venture capital investment — an important measure of the quality of our business climate and people’s faith in our future.

Yet, year after year, many of our politicians continue to add costs and regulatory burdens while ignoring pleas to evaluate Maine’s competitive situation and take steps to make it a place where people want to invest, innovate and grow. Year after year, additional costs, regulations and reports are piled on Maine’s businesses with virtually no effort to understand their impact on jobs, wages, sales, taxes, talent or investment. Each new burdensome policy is added with never a thought to its overall impact or the need to offset its cost to maintain, if not improve, Maine’s competitive position relative to other states.

The situation in Maine isn’t going to improve until we make building a strong economy our top priority, we analyze our competitive position and we make and follow a plan to improve our standing.

Mitch DeBlois
Lewiston