More Mixed Messages: Is Obama Helping or Hurting Small Businesses?

If you are a small business owner in this country, you’ve got to be confused by what you are hearing out of Washington these days. One day, the president is signing bi-partisan legislation designed to make it easier for small businesses to raise capital, the next day he threatens to veto a small business tax cut bill.

And what about Obamacare and its multitude of new or higher taxes, several of which make things very difficult for those businesses with less than 100 employees? It’s no wonder many Americans don’t know what to think about most of the legislation proposed these days. 

So, why the inconsistency from Mr. Obama? Recently, he encouraged a group of soon-to-be college graduates in North Carolina and Ohio to start small businesses and “make their own destiny.” The president pitched his bill to freeze student loan rates, while NOT explaining that this bill will be funded by taxes on small businesses – the very thing he was encouraging them to start. This seems like a giant conflict of interest despite the fact that freezing student loan rates is a good thing. The American people can’t forget every bill comes with a price that must be paid by someone.

Yet the White House rolls out one job creation/small business stimulus bill after another. Should small business owners expect any benefit from these bills? Not likely, according to USA Today’s Rhonda Abrams, who says “…most of these changes aren't intended for you and other small-business owners. The primary purpose of the lower tax rate proposal is to entice large corporations to keep more of their money and their jobs in the United States instead of fleeing to foreign tax havens.” 

Is the president merely pandering to these staples of the American economy in order to fund other billion-dollar big government legislation or is he genuinely trying everything he can to get this economy turned around? The next few months will, hopefully, clear up this incredibly cloudy picture.

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