Rhode Island is about the size of many city-states located around the Mediterranean of antiquity. They were small, independent nations inside what is today modern Greece, Italy, and northern Africa. Can Rhode Island consider itself to be a modern version?

States in America today are parts of one nation separated only by some legal distinctions. The only things keeping a R.I. individual, family or company from moving to another state are tradition, sentiment and jobs. We are the fourth generation to live here, our relatives are buried here, there is a good job here and we have excellent workers here.

The state budget passed by the General Assembly underscores ancient city-state thinking: we are unique, separate and apart, and we have long survived. But today any person with an Internet connection, let alone an entrepreneur, investor or established company, can learn of Rhode Island's fiscal condition, tax structure, business incentives and general hospitality to job creation in an hour. This is a big disadvantage to Rhode Island.

Too little opportunity, high taxes and a civic culture that can demonstrate taste but no appetite for growth dissolve even the strongest bonds of tradition and sentiment. What skills did those who have left possess? How many elected not to come here at all? How many businesses have moved out of state? What do companies looking to move from elsewhere consider?

One thing any business owner or executive would check is the union climate. No sensible person would attempt to create 50 or 100 jobs in a state that appeared to be in thrall to unions when there are dozens of states with lower taxes, more incentives, and elected officials who are not toadying to union bosses, their members' dues and donated bodies at election time.

According to the invaluable Center for Union Facts (www.unionfacts.com), the 2005 total union membership in RI stood at 52,509, which is roughly 16 percent, or one of every 6, employed persons. The unions representing these employees had receipts of $26,858,515 and spent $25,435,892 a lot of money in a little state.

Of the 52,509 union members, 62 percent are public employees. Incredibly, in a state with just over 1 million people, there are 50,060 government employees (2005 number, assumed higher today). The National Education Association of R.I. (NEARI) says it has 10,500 members, while the RI Federation of Teachers and Healthcare Professionals lists 10,000 members. Thus, 39 percent of the states public-union employees are teachers and some health care workers. This explains why the teachers' unions have such clout at the General Assembly. And, 98 percent of RI union contributions were to Democrats from 2004 through 2006.

Does all this matter, or is union sway at the State House just a historic R.I. peculiarity? You be the judge. California is, in many ways including union influence, R.I. writ large. California is busy going down the tubes and not the ones surfers long for. On the other hand, there is Texas. It has six of the largest U.S. cities, an economy that would make it the fifteenth in the world as a national economy, has a majority of the new U.S. jobs created in 2008, and, also in 2008, passed New York state as the home of the largest number of Fortune 500 companies (National Review<$>, July 20, 2009).

How? Texas has no income tax. Texas has a part-time legislature that meets once every two years. It has one of the finest university systems in the country, along with world-class medical research and treatment centers. It welcomes business. It tries to minimize the over-regulation that adds to business costs and restricts flexibility with nebulous gains. It keeps state taxes low by keeping spending low. And, it is a Right-to-Work state.

Meanwhile, back here in Lil Rhody (a non-Right-to-Work state), the NEA of R.I. said this on its NEARI blog about the East Providence School Committee/Teacher's Union situation: "the RA [Representative Assembly a national NEA group] sent a message to the East Providence School Committee that they won't tolerate school committees and their lawyers who try to threaten collective bargaining."

Nationwide, 37 percent of public-sector workers are in unions, compared to 62 percent in Rhode Island. The outsized role R.I. public employee unions have achieved for themselves is a worse than zero-sum game for our state: as union bosses and members thrive, R.I. continues its decline.

Are there any beaches in Austin?

Thomas Linehan is the Fellow for Small Business Affairs at the Ocean State Policy Research Institute.