Chicago Columnist Illinois Leader Entrepreneur Political Analyst Business Advisor Illinois Review

Friday, March 4, 2005

By Ralf Seiffe

OPINION - For the Star Trek generation, the most fearful entity the Enterprise might have encountered would be a black hole.

These dark stars occur when a star exhausts its fuel and its light fades. Then, the remaining material begins to cave in. As the collapse continues, the dead star’s material becomes very dense and as it does, the gravity of the star increases unimaginably.

Mass creates gravity and as the star’s left over matter condenses, its gravitational force increases correspondingly. Eventually, the gravitational force becomes so strong that nothing can escape it, not even light.

The reason black holes would terrify Captain Kirk is because once these insatiable bodies devour their own matter, they begin to consume all other material in their gravitational field. When they incorporate new matter, their total mass increases and their gravitational force also increases. The black hole is then able to subsume more material and become even stronger. Conceivably, a black hole could consume the entire universe so if the Enterprise detected a black hole, the captain and crew would devote their full energies to escaping its force.

This celestial phenomenon has an earthly analog---right here in Illinois.

Terrestrial entities all want to get larger and grow to their full potential. Extraordinarily successful companies sometimes grow to become so large that there is no room for others in their markets. We call these monopolies and when they begin to use their size and market share to compete unfairly, we restrain them with anti-trust laws.

Other organizations are exempt from such limits. Governmental agencies grow by a process similar to that of a black hole. As these agencies get funds, they add to their mass in the form of dependants which provides more political power. As the agency gains power, it gains funding and as it gains funding, it gains more dependants. Eventually, it becomes an irresistible power, just like the dead star gobbling all in its path.

The education business demonstrates this phenomenon. Like a spinning quasar, educrats at all levels are growing faster than the economic universes in which they operate. As a consequence of this growth, the education business is becoming the central generator of gravity in most political jurisdiction.

These educational black holes are growing in much the same way as their heavenly analogs.

Excellence, once the light that our schools produced, has gone out. Our children, once the best educated in the world, have fallen behind every other major nation in the real universe. We seem to be seeing the dark system begin to collapse in on itself.

Indeed, the more mass we devote to education, the less light we seem to get. This tends to make us devote yet more resources without getting much more light. The cycle then repeats and the whole system ratchets into a bigger and more expensive body.

The essence of black holes is the gravitational pull they exert in the surrounding space. There is a point called the “event horizon” which is quite like the point where a magnet pulls in a ball bearing. This boundary marks the difference between observing a black hole and becoming one because once past this point, escape is impossible. Knowing this, Captain Kirk would devote every erg available to avoid passing a black hole’s event horizon.

House Bill 750 is a financial event horizon lurking in Illinois legislature. If Democrats and Republicans pass House Bill 750, our economy will suffer the same fate as the Enterprise slipping beyond an extraterrestrial event horizon.

Raising tax rates by a minimum of two-thirds will drive the light producing elements in our state to other, more hospitable stars. When that happens, the tax masters will have a smaller tax base with which to work, so they will raise rates to maintain revenues. That will drive more producers off leaving a smaller...well, you see how a black hole works.

Illinois needs a hero on its bridge who recognizes HB 750 as the event horizon that it is. We need a Captain Kirk who understands that HB 750 is the point of no return for the Illinois’ economy and who will devote every waking moment to escaping the danger HB 750 represents.

In this is an opportunity for one of next year’s potential Republican candidates for captain.

The first candidate who reallocates campaign money from next year’s primary to defeat HB 750 now will do a great service for Illinois. Republicans will recognize him as the front-runner for the nomination and as the favorite in the general election. Even better, it will only cost 20% of what a successful media campaign will cost a year from now.

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Ralf Seiffe advises business start-ups and product launches from Chicago, Illinois and is a political analyst and columnist for the Illinois Leader.