Small Biz Owners Say Job Exports, Not Regs Problem
Republicans who claim they are BFF with small business owners–yet insist ”over regulation” is causing the nation’s economic woes–ought to listen to what their “best friends” have to say.
A new poll of 500 small business owners finds that cutting regulations is far down their list of priorities to boost their businesses. They say weak customer demand—not government regulations—is their biggest concern and that the best way to create jobs is to eliminate incentives to move jobs overseas.
The boogieman of regulations is fifth on the list after ending job export incentives, boosting consumer demand, increasing consumer purchasing, and investing in infrastructure like roads and bridges. Read the rest of this entry »
Legislation Would Stop Corporate Offshore Tax Evasion Schemes
Here’s one contributor to the deficit Republicans don’t want to talk about. Loopholes in our tax laws allow multinational companies and hedge funds to shelter enormous sums of money from taxes by creating offshore identities and using tax-haven banks. This practice costs nearly $100 billion in taxes each year, according to the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations.
The Stop Tax Haven Abuse Act, introduced yesterday by Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.), would close these loopholes and strengthen the government’s ability to collect taxes that are due.
“People are sick and tired of tax dodgers using offshore trickery and abusive tax shelters to avoid paying their fair share,” Levin told a Capitol Hill press conference yesterday.
Small Business Group, HCAN Blast WellPoint CEO Pay, Consumer Rate Hikes
The CEO and board of directors of health insurance giant WellPoint faced tough questions about the company’s excessive rate hikes, its campaign to kill health care reform and executive pay from shareholders—including small business owners—at its annual board meeting yesterday.
WellPoint shareholders from the small business group Main Street Alliance and the coalition Health Care for America Now (HCAN) blasted the recent increase in CEO Angela Braly’s total compensation—which skyrocketed by 51 percent in 2009 to $13.1 million. They also challenged as inaccurate the company’s submission of data to California regulators to convince them to permit double-digit premium increases for individuals in 2010. The company withdrew its plans to raise rates by as much as 39 percent after regulators questioned the figures submitted by WellPoint subsidiary Anthem Blue Cross.
Small Biz Group Says Health Care Reform Could Save Them $855 Billion
Health care reform that requires employers to provide health care coverage for workers or pay into a fund—known as pay or play—could save small businesses as much as $855 billion during the next few years.
A new study by the Small Business Majority disproves claims by health care reform opponents that requiring businesses to provide coverage to their workers would destroy their bottom line.
The Economic Impact of Health Care reform on Small Business, written by Massachusetts Institute of Technology economics professor Jonathan Gruber, says that small businesses, more than any other sector of the economy, “suffer from our broken health care system.”
From spiraling premiums to inadequate access to health care for themselves and their employees, small business owners have seen their prospects for growth diminished and their profits slashed by today’s patchwork of inefficient health care options.
Survey: Will Small Business Owners Support Health Care Reform this Time?
As part of our series looking at health care reform proposals and initiatives from a range of groups and experts, today we take a look at the small business community.
In the early 1990s, when President Clinton launched his ambitious campaign for comprehensive health care reform, it was the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) that struck the sharpest knife into the reform initiative.
