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[quote=Anonymous]I'm from Mass. so I guess I am more familiar with his time there.  I don't have time to fully document his tenure as governor but 10 seconds pulled up this Boston Globe story, including these assessments from perhaps the main lobbyist for businesses in Mass. (AIM) and someone (Widmer) from a respected business-funded thinktank--

On the campaign trail in 2002, Romney promised a jobs creation program “second to none in the history of the state,” pledging to use his corporate connections to lure chief executives across America to Massachusetts.

The results fell far short of the promise. During Romney’s four years in office, the state added a net 31,000 jobs, a growth rate of less than 1 percent compared to 5 percent nationally during the same period. State unemployment fell to 4.7 percent from a peak of 6 percent, but remained above the US average, then 4.4 percent.

Meanwhile, as the state recovery lagged other parts of the country, a net 233,000 people -- 3.5 percent of the population -- left the state, many seeking jobs elsewhere.

“He was going to be the number one salesperson,” said Brian Gilmore, spokesman for Associated Industries of Massachusetts, the state’s largest business advocacy group. “I don’t think that turned out successfully.”

As with balancing the budget, Romney took a conventional approach to economic development, moving to reduce some business regulations and using taxpayer money, in the form of incentive programs, to try to stimulate job growth. Widmer said Romney undertook few initiatives that could have fundamentally altered the economic equation for the state, such as policies aimed at lowering Massachusetts’ electricity costs, which are among the highest in the nation.

Widmer pointed to William Weld, another Republican governor who took office during a recession and overhauled the state’s worker compensation system. It took a decade for those reforms to take full effect, but worker compensation costs for business plunged by two-thirds and helped make the state more competitive.

Romney did not have the patience for tackling issues that might only pay off in the long-term, Widmer said.

“His economic record was uninspired,” Widmer said. “They never developed an economic strategy nor implemented a coherent set of initiatives that would improve the state’s business climate.”

http://www.boston.com/businessupdates/2012/09/05/governor-romney-faced-similar-economic-situation-obama-with-similar-results/S2cHk3JRGn0hHRnbEFuh2M/story.html

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