By NANCY VORIS
Indiana Correspondent

INDIANAPOLIS, Ind. — Gov. Mitch Daniels went for the federal jugular as keynote speaker at the National Grain and Feed Assoc. (NGFA) Country Elevator Conference last week. Though some of his capitalistic policies have been criticized, Daniels has been credited with balancing Indiana’s budget at a time when other states are falling short.

“I wish the national policy looked more like what we have,” Daniels told a standing-room-only crowd. “These problems won’t handle themselves. You start with entitlement programs, and perform bariatric surgery on the federal government.”

His objective in Indiana is to drive businesses to make money so they can create jobs. That means challenging businesses to do their jobs better and faster, and to stop doing anything that is detrimental to the company’s health.
“When businesses ask what they can do to help Indiana,” Daniels said, “I tell them, go make money so you can help others with jobs. Every great business enterprise has a clear objective, and ours is to raise the net income of Hoosiers and to leave as many hard-earned dollars in their pockets as we can.”

Daniels’ political and financial resume is impressive. He served as chief of staff to Sen. Richard G. Lugar (R-Ind.), was a senior adviser to President Ronald Reagan and served as director of the White House Office of Management and Budget in the first term of President George W. Bush.

In addition, Daniels served as CEO for both the Hudson Institute, a think tank, and Eli Lilly and Co.’s North American pharmaceutical operations. He was elected to his second term as Indiana’s governor in 2008, receiving more votes than any candidate for public office in the state’s history.

At the conference, Daniels gave the keynote address to more than 640 industry leaders representing grain, feed, processing and related industries. On the national financial crisis, Daniels does not see actions that produce good results.
“We don’t see the recovery we need, much less a rousing recovery,” he said, adding that decisions are being made based on a 3.4 percent growth rate, which the country has not seen since 1950.

“Let’s hope we can spread awareness, which could then be a great unifying effort in Congress.”

He believes in a “taxation on purpose” philosophy, with the purpose being to promote growth in the private economy. “Capitalization is sustaining Indiana and could do the same at the federal level,” Daniels said.

NGFA policy priorities

NGFA Chair Hal Reed, president of the Grain and Ethanol Group at The Andersons in Maumee, Ohio, addressed the conference on the organization’s top policy priorities for 2011. He praised the NGFA for being a committee-driven organization, with 19 working committees from agri-terrorism to country elevator, to trade regulations.

He listed the following priorities for members for next year:

•Political action and grassroots involvement
•Commercial facility safety – a DVD is available at www.ngfa.org and, “It’s basic, but it could protect the lives of employees at plants,” Reed said.
•Risk management – The NGFA Trade Rules and Disputes Resolution Seminar is scheduled for May 3, 2011, in St. Louis, Mo.
•Convergence with boards of trade
•Warehousing and storage
•Food and feed safety
•International trade
•Transportation – secure infrastructure, waterways, locks, dams, railways
•Financial outlook

James Glassman, managing director and senior economist for JPMorgan Chase & Co. of New York, provided a financial outlook for the U.S. and global economy. According to Glassman, the “economic winter is over and spring is coming.”
“What lies ahead is a cyclical recovery, and the dynamics of that is beginning to take shape,” he said.

He described the global economy as being synchronized and now coming alive. But he described the new “normal,” where jobs have been lost and gone elsewhere. “They’ve disappeared,” Glassman said. “Unemployment is high and we have to get used to it.”

He said many believe that because of the housing debacle – and the burst bubble – that the economy is doomed. But he said this is contrary to history and the nation has experience in getting on its feet.

“We can do two things. We can sit and do nothing and hope time will cure everything, like Japan, or we can get down to business and fix problems, which is the U.S. way,” he said.

Glassman said experience is the best way to prevent economic problems from happening again. He said we have already taken steps to recovery, including:

•Correcting inflated conditions: “It’s behind us, the story is over.”

•Companies are more profitable: “We’re seeing a resumption of capital spending and expansion is good.”

•The job market is good, considering seasonal distortions: “Don’t take monthly data too literally. The total hours worked by Americans has tripled, because employers ask for longer hours by employees before hiring.”

•Low inflation gives the Fed latitude

•Global imbalance: “The lights are coming on, for example, for the trade deficit.
The world around us are waking up and knowing they’re going down the wrong path. It’s an economic miracle, that the living standard is going up around the world, and the U.S. is the reason.”

Glassman said the “Made in China” label is generally not true. There is value added from many countries and China is the last stop. “The ag sector is on the front line of who benefits,” he added.

Other points he made were that layoffs are back to normal for the Midwest, the manufacturing sector is reemerging and car sales are at their highest record ever. He said the living standard is four times better for the United States than for people in India and China, who are at the U.S. living standard of the 1930s.
Glassman said the danger is behind us and the global economy is on the move: “The winter is over; we can carry on.”