Marketplace Magazine

November 16, 2009

I got this email from the American Small Business League Thursday:

On Oct. 21, President Barack Obama announced he would convene a small business conference to address increasing access to capital for small businesses. Yet less than a week before the conference is set to convene on Wednesday, Nov. 18, the Administration has refused to release any information regarding the event’s location, time, agenda or attendees.

The American Small Business League (ASBL) is concerned that the administration is withholding details on the conference as a means of preventing legitimate small business concerns, small business advocates and the media from attending.

“This is a clear indication that President Obama has no intention of adopting any policies that will actually benefit legitimate small businesses. My guess is that this is going to be a love-fest for his venture capitalist buddies and the Fortune 500 firms he is giving small business contracts to every day,” ASBL President Lloyd Chapman said.

The ASBL is predicting that the meeting could actually propose creating a loophole that would divert federal small business contracts away from legitimate small businesses and into the hands of wealthy venture capitalists under the guise of “increasing access to capital” for small businesses. The ASBL is concerned that in a worst-case scenario President Obama may even try to wind down federal small business contracting programs under the guise of bolstering the SBA by combining it with the U.S. Department of Commerce.

The ASBL questions the motives of President Obama and the legitimacy of the conference as a whole.

“Obviously they don’t want media coverage of their sham small business conference and they clearly don’t want any input from legitimate small business advocates,” Chapman said. The administration’s strategy may be to prevent input from small business groups that have complained about the Obama Administration awarding millions of dollars a day in federal small business contracts to Fortune 500 corporations, including stimulus dollars, according to the ASBL.

The ASBL points to the fact that the Administration has allocated less than 1 percent of stimulus funds to small businesses. …

“If President Obama really wanted to help small businesses he would have honored his February 2008 campaign promise to ‘end the diversion of federal small business contracts to corporate giants,’ but he hasn’t done that has he?” Chapman said.

This is ironic given that today begins Global Entrepreneurship Week. But it’s not surprising, in part because the Obama administration is developing a reputation for listening to only what it wants to hear. (Which makes them far from unique in the political class, of course.)

The other unsurprising thing is that, beyond the aforementioned venture capitalists, the Obama administration seems to consider two kinds of businesses, and only two kinds, to be worthy: high-tech companies (which makes potential Democratic gubernatorial candidate Kevin Conroy perfect for the state Democratic Party) and “green” businesses. Neither of those kinds of businesses can be considered large-scale employers, at least not now.

Venture capital-funded and high-tech businesses are high-risk high-reward ventures, and ventures found more often in the Madison–Milwaukee axis than up here where we build things. (And, to environmentalists’ tsk-tsking, use a lot of energy, much of it created by coal, to build things. Obama’s cap-and-trade proposal appears increasingly likely to stick it to Wisconsin’s economy, and particularly Northeast Wisconsin’s economy, than to provide benefits we’ll get to enjoy in our lifetimes.) “Green” businesses are businesses too, of course, but “green” is usually more expensive in the short term (and not always better products) than non-green competing products. One reason for going green, of course, is long-term savings (return on investment), but that can be difficult to justify in periods of tight cash flow, depending on how long ROI is.

So if the ASBL thinks Obama’s small business conference is going to be a dog-and-pony show where everyone is singing out of the same hymnal, well, they’re not alone.

Source:  http://www.marketplacemagazine.com/blogs/blog2.php/2009/11/16/a-conference-where-you-re-not-invited

To the Editor:

“Jobless Recovery” (editorial, Nov. 8) points to the need for more action by both government and the private sector to combat unemployment. Despite the stimulus spending, employers do not seem to feel the need to create jobs.

If companies can survive by getting greater productivity from the labor force, globalizing production and relying on research and design developed by partnerships with companies in other regions of the world, why should they hire United States workers?

Using the oxymoron of a jobless recovery dramatizes the gap between abstract indicators and the “real” economy, in which men and women need jobs to buy groceries, pay off loans and send their children to college.

Historically, the creation of full-time jobs is a lagging indicator of recovery that follows growth in production. But pundits today speak of rising stock market values as a “leading” indicator. Under current conditions, which indicator should we trust?

Sharon Zukin
New York, Nov. 8, 2009

The writer is a professor of sociology at Brooklyn College, CUNY.

•

To the Editor:

So the corporate C.E.O.’s and their friends now reap what they have sown. For the last two decades, they have systematically (with tax subsidies at times) stripped middle- and working-class America of the jobs, financial security and health care that they depended on to buy those same companies’ cars, “labor saving” devices, electronic devices and all other manner of stuff.

The cost savings conveniently floated up the pyramid and were split among the executives and their board members, lawyers, accountants, investment bankers and other friends.

Now Middle America is broke and can no longer support those at the top of the pyramid. Or their big bonuses. Or their friends and hangers-on.

It’s going to stay that way until they start to undo what they have done and bring jobs back — real jobs with health care.

Elizabeth A. Letzler
Baldwin, N.Y., Nov. 8, 2009

The writer is a retired former banker and certified financial planner.

•

To the Editor:

Your editorial says the country needs a program to help unemployed teenagers. The problem is that high minimum wages discourage employers from hiring inexperienced workers.

Minimum wage laws increase the pay of the employed but prevent other workers from getting that first job. Instead of looking for a new solution, Congress should admit the unintended negative consequences of its previous good will and repeal the minimum wage.

Damian Bickett
Berkeley, Calif., Nov. 8, 2009

•

To the Editor:

The American Small Business League is concerned that the Obama administration is doing nothing of major significance to aid our country’s 27 million small businesses, or to create jobs.

In August, we conducted an analysis of the government’s small-business contracting data for the fiscal year 2008. We found 60 large corporations in the top 100 recipients of small-business contracts. Also, scores of Fortune 500 firms were counted toward the government’s goal.

As a senator in February 2008, Barack Obama said it was time to end these abuses, yet he has not taken any action to honor his words.

President Obama should support H.R. 2568, the Fairness and Transparency in Contracting Act of 2009. It would redirect approximately $100 billion a year in federal infrastructure spending back to the middle-class economy, saving thousands of businesses and countless jobs.

Lloyd Chapman
Petaluma, Calif., Nov. 8, 2009

The writer is president of the American Small Business League.

To the Editor:

How many thousands of our technical workers now face long-term unemployment after seeing their jobs sent offshore? Many of these people have university degrees. Their offshore counterparts are also highly educated but are paid at far lower rates.

It is clear that these jobs will never return. A significant number of people in this group will remain unemployed. The lucky few will find jobs in alternative areas at far lower salaries than they once enjoyed.

The permanent underemployment of highly educated people will not only lower their standard of living for the rest of their lives, but will also negatively affect the entire economy unless alternative paths to success can be created. Ideas, please ... anyone?

Michael Devon
Berwyn, Pa., Nov. 8, 2009

•

To the Editor:

Re “Jobless Rate Hits 10.2%, With More Underemployed” (front page, Nov. 7):

You report that 17.5 percent of Americans were unemployed or underemployed last month. This true unemployment rate spotlights the fallacy with unemployment figures globally. The poor and “unemployable” are systematically omitted from government statistics.

In Latin America, for example, people below the poverty line are not included in the unemployment data. True unemployment in most of the countries of Latin America, taking the approach of your article, hovers between 20 and 30 percent.

The tragedy is that the people who are included in these statistics are the potential consumers who would drive the engines of their domestic economies if they could earn a living wage and were integrated into the economy.

L. Ronald Scheman
Charleston, S.C., Nov. 7, 2009

The writer was United States executive director of the Inter-American Development Bank from 1992 to 1998.

•

To the Editor:

“The Recession’s Over, but Not the Layoffs” (Week in Review, Nov. 8) explores the reasons that the slight economic improvement has not resulted in job growth.

The poor performance of the job market should be expected. Over the last 50 years, full employment and job creation have not been central to economic policy-making in the United States.

Economic policy has generally focused on maximizing profits by reducing business costs through such devices as tax reductions and minimizing constraints on business. In this context, wages and benefits are costs to be minimized.

Until the United States is willing to consider a balanced view of employment as both a business cost and a source of income and aggregate demand that supports economic growth, the bad news from the labor market is likely to continue.

Richard N. Block
East Lansing, Mich., Nov. 10, 2009

The writer is a professor at the School of Labor and Industrial Relations at Michigan State University.

A version of this article appeared in print on November 15, 2009, on page WK9 of the New York edition.

Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/15/opinion/l15jobs.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=lloyd%20chapman&st=cse

I got this email from the American Small Business League Thursday:

On Oct. 21, President Barack Obama announced he would convene a small business conference to address increasing access to capital for small businesses. Yet less than a week before the conference is set to convene on Wednesday, Nov. 18, the Administration has refused to release any information regarding the event’s location, time, agenda or attendees.

The American Small Business League (ASBL) is concerned that the administration is withholding details on the conference as a means of preventing legitimate small business concerns, small business advocates and the media from attending.

“This is a clear indication that President Obama has no intention of adopting any policies that will actually benefit legitimate small businesses. My guess is that this is going to be a love-fest for his venture capitalist buddies and the Fortune 500 firms he is giving small business contracts to every day,” ASBL President Lloyd Chapman said.

The ASBL is predicting that the meeting could actually propose creating a loophole that would divert federal small business contracts away from legitimate small businesses and into the hands of wealthy venture capitalists under the guise of “increasing access to capital” for small businesses. The ASBL is concerned that in a worst-case scenario President Obama may even try to wind down federal small business contracting programs under the guise of bolstering the SBA by combining it with the U.S. Department of Commerce.

The ASBL questions the motives of President Obama and the legitimacy of the conference as a whole.

“Obviously they don’t want media coverage of their sham small business conference and they clearly don’t want any input from legitimate small business advocates,” Chapman said. The administration’s strategy may be to prevent input from small business groups that have complained about the Obama Administration awarding millions of dollars a day in federal small business contracts to Fortune 500 corporations, including stimulus dollars, according to the ASBL.

The ASBL points to the fact that the Administration has allocated less than 1 percent of stimulus funds to small businesses. …

“If President Obama really wanted to help small businesses he would have honored his February 2008 campaign promise to ‘end the diversion of federal small business contracts to corporate giants,’ but he hasn’t done that has he?” Chapman said.

This is ironic given that today begins Global Entrepreneurship Week. But it’s not surprising, in part because the Obama administration is developing a reputation for listening to only what it wants to hear. (Which makes them far from unique in the political class, of course.)

The other unsurprising thing is that, beyond the aforementioned venture capitalists, the Obama administration seems to consider two kinds of businesses, and only two kinds, to be worthy: high-tech companies (which makes potential Democratic gubernatorial candidate Kevin Conroy perfect for the state Democratic Party) and “green” businesses. Neither of those kinds of businesses can be considered large-scale employers, at least not now.

Venture capital-funded and high-tech businesses are high-risk high-reward ventures, and ventures found more often in the Madison–Milwaukee axis than up here where we build things. (And, to environmentalists’ tsk-tsking, use a lot of energy, much of it created by coal, to build things. Obama’s cap-and-trade proposal appears increasingly likely to stick it to Wisconsin’s economy, and particularly Northeast Wisconsin’s economy, than to provide benefits we’ll get to enjoy in our lifetimes.) “Green” businesses are businesses too, of course, but “green” is usually more expensive in the short term (and not always better products) than non-green competing products. One reason for going green, of course, is long-term savings (return on investment), but that can be difficult to justify in periods of tight cash flow, depending on how long ROI is.

So if the ASBL thinks Obama’s small business conference is going to be a dog-and-pony show where everyone is singing out of the same hymnal, well, they’re not alone.

Source:  http://www.marketplacemagazine.com/blogs/blog2.php/2009/11/16/a-conference-where-you-re-not-invited