Posted on 09/09/2012 5:19:27 AM PDT by Kaslin
The political conventions have passed, the August jobs report is out, and many Americans are said to be “giving up hope.”
So how can we jumpstart our greatest engine of economic growth – the American small business market – and get our economy growing again?
Regardless of which presidential candidate wins this November, in 2013 Americans will have to focus on saving, and expanding, the small business marketplace. The sector of our economy that makes up nearly 60% of the entire American private sector workforce, and creates between 60 and 80% of all new jobs, has been under attack over the past few years by politicians who have created lots of bad laws.
And if Americans are serious about expanding actual employment (rather than merely expanding government welfare and entitlement programs), then we will have to make better choices at the ballot box, and hold our elected leaders responsible for making serious changes. To start, let’s consider consider this harsh reality: the so-called “fiscal cliff” is real, and President Obama’s proposed solution to it is potentially lethal.
Under current federal law, both income tax rates and Social Security tax rates are set to rise dramatically on January 1st of 2013. Along with these tax increases, a dramatic reduction in government services will take hold at the same time.
This confluence of private citizens having more of their money taken away (higher taxes), and a reduction of government services (which means that private citizens will have to fill the gap and spend more of their own money) is expected to trigger a new recession next year. As a means of preventing a “double dip,” both Republicans and Democrats in the Congress have proposed that taxation rates be frozen where they are at, and held steady in 2013.
But President Obama has insisted that taxes should be raised on so-called “rich people” next year, and has refused to do what most economists and many members of his party have said is the one thing that could save us from another downturn.
And with the President polling as well as he is, it seems apparent that millions of Americans are far more excited about his “make the rich pay” rhetoric than they are aware of the consequences of his proposals. Obama supporters may get their wish in November, but it will come at a painful price – a price that all of us will pay.
And here’s another harsh reality: Americans need to get comfortable with other people’s financial successes. Since the early days of his first presidential campaign in 2007, Barack Obama has been pouring fuel on the fires of resentment and envy towards the wealthy. As a political strategy this has worked well for the President, but as government policy this has been bad for all of us.
The President’s tax-hike push is a perfect example, as many of America’s small businesses are set-up under the I.R.S. code as “Sub-chapter S” corporations. These are businesses wherein the company profits are reported to the I.R.S. directly as personal income by the business owners and are subject to personal income tax rates – and many of these business owners are being targeted by President Obama for an income tax-hike.
If the President gets his wish, and the government begins confiscating more money from the owners of Sub-chapter S corporations, by definition this leaves less money in these corporations for hiring and expansion. Thus Americans have a choice to make – do we want to employ our President for another four years so he can satiate the hatred some of us have towards “the rich” and take away more of their money? Or would we like private business owners to have money available to employ more of us? From the way things appear right now, we probably can’t do both.
And here’s harsh reality number three: Americans have to stop Obamacare from wiping-out small businesses. A central feature of this law is the mandate that businesses provide healthcare insurance to their workers. It sounds great – workers will now be “guaranteed” health insurance – but once again, the “make somebody else pay” approach is heaping more weight on the shoulders of small business owners.
Americans must decide how serious they are about job creation – even if it means that some jobs won’t include health benefits. If we honestly want employers to employ more, we must force the Congress and the President to fix this devastating component of Obamacare next year.
And here’s yet another harsh reality: Americans must stop making small businesses a scapegoat on illegal immigration. Roughly two-thirds of Americans want our national borders secured and a coherent immigration policy, yet for over a decade Washington has refused to do the former and has scarcely attempted the latter.
Amid the frustration, businesses have become the target of Americans’ wrath. If business owners would simply quit hiring illegals -so the reasoning goes -the illegals would go away.
Mitt Romney has pledged that, if elected, he will seek to require American employers and workers to register with the federal government’s “e-verify” website, as a means of policing the problem. But this adds even more bureaucratic burdens to small business owners, and ignores our failed immigration policies and un-secured borders.
Do we want politicians who merely tell us what we want to hear? Or do we want leaders in our government who can actually enable businesses to grow? Americans must become more discerning-and face some harsh realities.
So ... you're saying it's hopeless?
Oil, Gas and Coal to start, not to hard. On the eve of election night it will either go off the cliff or we will see a natural improvement just in the announcement of. Support your military who are being prevented from voting get someone you know who hasnt or will not to vote as a representative of a soldier who’s constitutional rights are being violated. Lets give the cretans a slap down the will not recover from.
The polls are showing this (yes I know everyone here is saying they are bias polls, but the majority of polls favor Obummer - that can't be ignored).
Romney is floundering badly ... he was a terrible choice.
Next year is going to be a nightmare and if the Repubs hold the House, they will get all the blame and Obummer will skate next year being able to point at them as the source of all the problems.
1. By means of a mountain of punitive laws and regulations, the fedgov leviathan has functionally outlawed jobs by making the cost of labor prohibitive.
2. The ‘education’ establishment has produced an army of unskilled, entitled illiterates.
3. The socialist enterprise has so beaten down the economy that there are no customers for anything but the bare essentials.
Can there be any wonder that businesses don’t rush out to hire expensive, incompetent employees to service customers they don’t have?
Like it or not, he is our nominee and for all we know he might turn out to be a good president. Definitely better then that arrogant pos that currently occupies 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. Hold your nose, if you have to. I have at times and actually not regretted it
” So how can we jumpstart our greatest engine of economic growth –the American small business market –and get our economy growing again?”
Cut taxes and eliminate government regulations. Get rid of the EPA.
In other words, let the free market run FREE.
“I’m not asking for help, Mike. Just take off the handcuffs.” -Sal Tessio, The Godfather
Romney energy policies would be far better than Obama's and would be like a tax cut for all Americans. I have never been a Romney supporter but I feel that it is my duty to defeat the greatest evil that has ever threatened our country.
If personal income tax rates rise considerably under the "Obama tax hike" as described here, couldn't a case be made that small business owners can take perfectly legal steps to minimize the impact of these hikes under the tax code? If personal income tax rates are very high, then a small business owner has the option to reorganize the corporation as a standard "C" corporation (where profits are subject to corporate taxes) rather than an "S" corporation (where profits are reported on the owners' individual returns as ordinary income).
Am I missing something here?
If Romney can't beat Obama, then nobody can. Heck, Obama comes across as a guy who doesn't even want the job anymore ... probably because he himself acknowledged back in 2009 that he doesn't deserve it ("If I don’t have this done in three years, than this is going to be a one-term proposition.")
The last couple of days of the Democratic National Convention offered a pretty startling glimpse into the internal party politics of the Democrats, with political hack and former president Bill Clinton showing more enthusiasm for Obama's campaign than Obama himself. Obama's comment yesterday, in which he suggested that Bill Clinton should be named "Secretary of Explaining Stuff," was perhaps the most comical -- and strangest -- statement I've ever seen from a political candidate on a national stage.
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