Petaluma, Calif. - Leaders from the U.S. House of Representatives have narrowly passed a, "Jobs for Main Street Bill," and once again failed to heed strong recommendations from America's 27 million small businesses.  The bill has drawn strong criticism from both Republicans and Democrats:

"As the old axiom goes, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing twice and expecting different results.  With that in mind, it's astounding Speaker Pelosi would repeat the same mistakes with her second stimulus as she did with her first."
-  Congressman Aaron Schock (R-IL), December 16, 2009

"I believe Congress must continue taking strong action to create jobs, but any jobs package should have significant support for small businesses. I have been arguing for months that expanding small business lending is critical to getting our economy moving again, and this bill should have had far more small business support."
- Congressman Gary Peters (D-MI), December 16, 2009

Congress' jobs bill, H.R. 2847, allocates $75 billion in redirected TARP funds for "targeted investments."  However, the bill fails to address the diversion of more than $100 billion a year in government small business contracts away from legitimate small businesses and into the hands of corporate giants.  The American Small Business League (ASBL) maintains that the House's bill does little to address widespread fraud, abuse and loopholes in small business contracting programs, which continue at the cost of countless jobs every year. 

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, small businesses are responsible for more than 50 percent of America's Gross Domestic Product (GDP), 50.2 percent of the non-farm private sector work force and more than 97 percent of all net new jobs.  A recent study from the Kauffman Foundation found that firms less than five-years-old are responsible for nearly all net new jobs. http://www.kauffman.org/research-and-policy/where-will-the-jobs-come-from.aspx 

"If Congress wanted to pass a jobs bill, it would pass H.R. 2568, the Fairness and Transparency in Contracting Act of 2009. That bill would redirect more than $100 billion a year in federal infrastructure dollars to small businesses directly," ASBL President Lloyd Chapman said. "Congress' latest blunder is a one time hit, and a repeat of an already failed attempt to stimulate the economy. The Fairness and Transparency in Contracting Act is the simplest and most effective stimulus proposed to date and would continue to help small businesses year-after-year." https://www.asbl.com/documents/hr2568.pdf

The House's, "Jobs for Main Street Bill," allocates less than 2.5 percent of the total volume of stimulus dollars invested by the government to small businesses which create virtually 100 percent all net new jobs.

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