Evan Falchuk is the United Independent Party candidate for Governor of Massachusetts, focused on fiscally sensible solutions and pragmatically progressive ideas. For more information visit www.Falchuk2014.org.

The views expressed here purely those of the candidate and not necessarily BostInno’s.

One of the things we have in great abundance in Massachusetts is ideas. The big challenge any tech or start-up company faces is how you take a terrific idea and turn it into a reality. How do you morph smart thinking into a viable business?

Our state government cannot just nibble around the edges anymore and “hope for the best” when it comes to growing businesses and startups in our innovation economy. Government has a central role to play in ensuring the soil of Massachusetts is as fertile as possible for these companies to plant solid roots and thrive.

I believe our political system – limited to just Democrats and Republicans – is not offering innovative policies and forward-thinking ideas on this front. This creates obstacles for startup and tech businesses trying to flourish

The good news is we can start to reverse course, if we use the same innovative, imaginative thinking in government policy that so many startups and tech businesses rely on. We can build consensus around policies that drive increased business, while also working to drive down the cost of living and of doing business here.

So what, exactly, are some of the key solutions to help a lot more tech and startup businesses in Massachusetts reach this desired next level?

Quite a few – and they’re solutions that lawmakers have not been focusing on nearly enough. Savvy business solutions don’t always need to focus solely on tax breaks for companies, for starters.

Here are three things I’m convinced are central to ensuring that tech companies, venture-backed businesses and startup companies are best positioned for success in Massachusetts.

#1: Healthcare 

Massachusetts is a leader in making sure people have access to health coverage. But one of the great challenges we have in our state is that while coverage is nearly universal, it’s also almost universally too expensive – the priciest of any state, in fact.

From firsthand business experience over the years, and feedback from the many business owners and policy experts I’ve talked with, healthcare costs are one of the biggest barriers to small business growth. These growing costs are driven in Massachusetts by monopolistic practices in the healthcare market, and the entrenched Democratic and Republican lawmakers who permit this.

When you have just three health insurers in our state controlling 79% of the market, combined with hospitals that are on a buying binge gobbling up other hospitals to add to their ever-growing hospital systems – which themselves control 72% of the market – you have a recipe for higher prices. It’s the nature of the beast. And while health company executives reap millions in compensation from this, the cost at the end of the day falls on consumers, doctors – and the many small businesses eager to grow in our state.

These monopolistic practices must be reined in, plain and simple. Lawmakers must step up to the plate if they mean it when they say they want to act to control healthcare costs. And there’s no better time than the present.

#2: Housing

One of the major trends in our state, particularly among younger workers, is increasing “re-urbanization” – the growing desire to move into urban, rather than suburban, areas. As our population grows and changes, I see the revitalization of urban areas around our state as one of the great opportunities of the next decade. State and local government have an important role to play in accelerating this process, and can help provide thousands of new jobs in the process.

We have to craft policy tied to growing demand for creative housing alternatives. We need to implement a comprehensive policy that helps facilitate growing trends like re-urbanization and multi-family housing development, for starters. And we need to build into our development plans creative, shared work space alternatives that help nimble, growing businesses throughout the Commonwealth.

When it comes to affordable housing and office space, we can no longer view planning and progress through the same lens we’ve been using for the past century.

#3: Smart Education

Too often when we hear conversations about education or read about our schools, the bulk of the focus is on standardized testing, classroom size, and of course funding. While all are important issues, the mindset itself of focusing solely on these areas is dated.

We need to be investing resources and mindpower in tailoring our education and training – at all levels. We must implement a much more robust, widespread public-private partnership system that brings together the education community at all levels with the business community, to ensure schools are offering curricula that give students not just a career path, but the ability to actually do the jobs that businesses need. To do so represents one of the largest opportunities that workers and businesses could have.

This could begin with measurable, pilot programs in 10 key towns and cities throughout Massachusetts, with the goal of offering future workers so much more than just standard, test-based courses. Students of all ages could learn a much broader range of skills through expanded offerings, skills training, and creative apprenticeships that more directly link to the workplace and what businesses are most in need of hiring.

This could range from technical skills or engineering; communication or health training; or critical thinking, work ethic, and practical problem-solving. Students need more modern, expanded educational options if they are to find a place in the job market of the future – just as growing businesses benefit by hiring much more skilled workers.

I’m genuinely proud that among our state’s new and growing businesses, there truly is no shortage of bright ideas and world-class thinking. In the modern world, though, all lawmakers must realize that ideas born in Massachusetts can move at the speed of light and turn into businesses in other states.

Our state government’s obligation is to make sure the ideas generated here become businesses here, and the people behind ideas from around the world want to see those ideas come to Massachusetts to grow into thriving companies. Without the long overdue changes and improvements like the three above, however, calls for growth and supporting small businesses will continue to amount to little more than empty sound bites.

We can do better. We must do better. It’s the only way to get things done.