I want to start a business. What does independence mean for that?
On this page
TNM’s founding principles name the entrepreneur as the basic economic building block of Texas. Building something here is part of what independence is for.
The rulebook is written far away
Texas lives under more than a million federal restrictions, up from about 400,000 in 1970, and the Mercatus Center ranks Texas sixth of the fifty states in exposure to federal regulation. A small business follows those rules whether or not anyone in Texas voted for the people who wrote them.
Capital is already coming
You would not be starting from scratch. Texas gained about 130,000 people from other states in 2023, more than 200 corporate headquarters moved here between 2018 and 2023, and Texas won Site Selection magazine’s Governor’s Cup for the fourteenth year in a row in 2025.
What is known
Independence does not deregulate anything by itself. It changes who holds the pen: Texans, through a government they can vote out.
The bottom line
If you are building something, the rules you build under would be written in Texas. What Texas builds next is ours to decide.
Sources & further reading
Go deeper
More in Life in a Free Texas
- Would I have to serve in a Texas military?
- Will Texas have its own team in the Olympics?
- Will college sports teams still be able to play in the NCAA?
- Will Texas professional sports teams still play in their respective leagues?
- What happens to the Texas flag and state symbols?
- Would my gun rights change?
What this week means for Texas, and what to do about it.
Every week, Daniel Miller picks the two or three stories that actually moved Texas independence, tells you what they mean, and names one thing you can do about it. Short enough to finish in one sitting. No press releases, no filler. Add your name.
We send one email a week. Unsubscribe in one click. Your email won’t be sold. Ever.