Our forest-fire economy

Our economy is a lot like an Evergreen forest. It flourishes and grows for a very long time until, one day, a hunter comes along and forgets to put his fire out. The fire spreads, engulfing the dry adult pine trees (established businesses) until nothing is left but embers.

After a time, the embers settle and for a while, there will only be ash. The forest will be dead and it’s resident creatures (business owners, employees) will be left adrift and displaced.

Eventually, however, many new pine trees (startups) will begin to grow. While at first this new growth may only be able to support small creatures, the young trees thrive on the vast amounts of sunlight (customers) available to them.

Not all of these new trees will survive, of course. Over-crowding will force some to die when they can no longer get enough sunlight. Those that keep sight of the sun, though, will become healthy adults.

And after a time, the cycle starts again.

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Joshua Gross is a freelance web designer and developer based out of NYC.