And when I see my taxes going down every quarter — well, that means I am going to start investing again.”<br />While much has been made about the stock market’s nearly 14 percent rally since the election, economists say<br />that when it comes to assessing the genuine potential for the United States economy, confidence among small-business owners is a more grounded and forward-looking indicator.<br />“That guy is a junkyard dog, doing his tweets at 3 a.m.<br />and taking on the news media — I just get strength from him,” Mr. Soltis said over a wine-soaked dinner with a large group of his small-business friends and peers from around town.<br />“And now we have seen this huge spike in small-business confidence since the election,” Mr. Korzenik said, pointing to a chart.<br />Of late, the local economy has been recovering as thriving industries like health care have picked up the slack,<br />and the unemployment rate, at 4.7 percent, stands exactly at the national figure of 4.7 percent for February.
