By Laura Woodhead-Talk Radio News Service

Any health care reform legislation must include provisions to help small businesses, create more jobs and stimulate the economy, Senate Democrats said Wednesday.

“More than half of all Americans without health insurance are small business owners, their employees and their dependents,” said Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) during a press conference. “We are trying to craft a reform that will make health coverage more stable, more secure and more affordable.”

Senator Mary Landrieu (D-La.), Chair of the Senate Small Business Committee, said that the high costs of health care has been limiting the potential for U.S businesses to create more jobs.

“We are relying on these 27 million businesses to create more jobs, not less,” Landrieu said. “This health care expense is sitting on our Business Committee like a very wet, heavy heavy blanket suffocating their ability to grow and expand.”

Under the current drafts of health care reform legislation, small business risks would be pooled with other small businesses in order to stabilize the system through nationwide or statewide exchanges.

“Insurance companies would have to post their premiums side by side so that [employers] can comparison shop,” Durbin said. “[Small businesses] will have access to every private insurance company in [their] area.”

Senator Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.) said it was critical that small businesses were included in health care reform in order to stimulate the economy.

“[Small businesses] are the engines of our economy,” Lincoln stated. “We need to make sure that what we are doing is going to be helping them.”

Durbin admitted that forming the health care bill was a delicate process and that there would be “flash points” along the way, but urged his party’s colleagues to stay united in order to pass reform.

“[While] what is being produced by the bi-partisan group from the Finance Committee is not the bill that I would write, I have urged all my colleagues to stick with this process and realize that the first vote is not the last vote,” Durbin said. “The Republican [minority] want to filibuster us in to failure. We can’t let that happen.”

Maureen O ‘Conner, owner of Center Sheet Metal in Bronx, NY., says she would rather pay for her employees to have private health care coverage than have the government provide coverage for them. (0:23)

 

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Steve Rosenfield, owner of By The Rockies LLC., says he’d like to see the atmosphere in Washington D.C. reflect support for small business owners. He says no to new taxes on small businesses. (0:27)

 

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By Aaron Richardson – Talk Radio News Service

According to members of Congress, small business owners are the key to getting the economy back on it’s feet. Unfortunately, the proposed government run health care plan will levy a five percent payroll tax on small business owners who say this will cripple their finances and force many of them to shut down.

A roundtable discussion was held Tuesday in Washington D.C. to discuss the grievances small business owners have with government run health care.

“I would like to see an atmosphere out of Washington that says let’s help the small businessmen, not an atmosphere that says okay we have to pay for something let’s just hit the businessmen,” said Steve Rosenfield, owner of By The Rockies LLC.

“I’d have to put my employees on the government plan and I don’t want to. I want them to have the health care they like, go to the doctor they want to go to, get the tests that they need and I am willing to pay that no charge,” said Maureen O ‘Conner, owner of Center Sheet Metal in Bronx, NY.

House Committee on Small Business member Rep. Sam Graves (R-Mo.) explained that many Democrats are not being totally straight with the American public.

“We keep hearing about how the Administration and Speaker Polosi’s plan is going to save the tax payers millions of dollars by spending trillions of tax payer dollars, and it is ridiculous. In Washington they call that ‘bending the curve,’ in Missouri they call it bending the truth,” said Graves.

By Mariko Lamb – Talk Radio News Service

GOP Congresswomen and small business owners joined together Friday to voice alarm about the dire consequences of Congress passing the current health care reform bill.

“The Democrat way is not reforming healthcare, it’s destroying it,” said Rep. Michelle Bachman (R-Minn.).

“We are very concerned about the way it jeopardizes the doctor-patient relationship, we’re concerned about the additional debt, the trillions in spending that will add to the children and grandchildren that come after us, but worst of all, it’s going to further hurt our small business owners at a time when our economy is in trouble,” said Rep. Cathy McMorris-Rodgers (R-Wash.).

“President Obama’s prescription for healthcare reform for our nation is the wrong prescription for American families. We do not believe that we should put a federal bureaucrat between the patient and the doctor,” said Rep. Mary Fallin (R-Okla.).

Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) said Republicans have a plan that addresses costs, access, and insurance company accountability, but her Democratic counterparts will not listen. “We have been pushing forward our ideas, pushing forward our plans. It is unfortunate that the Democrat-led House is not wanting to make this a bipartisan goal of doing healthcare right,” she said.

Rep. Virginia Foxx (R-N.C.) disputed President Obama’s claim that 47 million Americans lack healthcare. “There are no Americans who don’t have healthcare. Everybody in this country has access to healthcare,” she said. “We do have about 7.5 million Americans who want to purchase health insurance who can not afford it,” she said, urging Congress to adopt a new plan for health care reform that won’t “destroy what is good about healthcare in this country” and “give the government control of our lives.”

Senator Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) discusses crafting health care legislation that Congress will pass, and says small businesses must be apart of the health care legislation. (0:19)

 

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by Christina Lovato, University of New Mexico-Talk Radio News Service

“This is a very good budget, because it’s an honest budget…Now just because this is an honest budget does not mean that this is an easy budget. The budget presents some difficult realities, and it presents some hard choices.” said Senate Finance Committee Chairman, Max Baucus (D-Mont).

Today in the Senate Finance Committee meeting, U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner testified and expressed why President Obama’s budget plan will work. ”We are absolutely committed to working with you on how to produce a package of reforms that meets the President’s broad principles in a way that is fiscally responsible for the country…We wanted to put on the table, to improve the credibility of our commitment to do this, concrete proposals that would achieve that.” Geithner stated. 

Senator Chuck Grassley (R-IA) said that in 2007 small business created 74% of new jobs. “I don’t understand why you would charge small business operators more than you would charge corporations…I want to emphasize for the Secretary over half are between 20 and 500 employees. Those larger small businesses are also businesses most likely to expand or contract depending on business conditions.” he stated.

In addition to discussions about small business, taxes, and health care reform, Geithner expressed two critical functions that the government must accomplish to get the economy back on track. “We need to make sure that banks have the resources needed to provide credit to the economy…The basic machinery necessary for credit to work in our country is broken in some respects, the pipes are clogged…So a critical second part of our program is to act directly to get credit flowing again to get those markets to start opening up. The entire small business lending market, the auto finance market, the student loan market, the consumer credit markets depend on that machinery.” Geithner concluded. 

The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) is opening its eyes and ears to small businesses and new technology. Frederick Downs, Jr., chief prosthetics and clinical logistics officer in the VA Office of Prosthetics and Clinical Logistics, discussed the new VA developments at a House Small Business Committee hearing. (more…)

Presumptive presidential nominee John McCain spoke at the 79th annual League of United Latin American Citizens. He said that over 400,000 jobs have been lost since September and gas has climbed to over $4.00 a gallon almost everywhere in America. He said that small businesses are the “job engine” of America and that there are over 2 million Latino owned small businesses. He said that this year small businesses have already created over 233,000 jobs.

He said, “If you believe you should pay more taxes, I’m the wrong candidate for you” McCain said that if elected he would reduce the estate tax to 15 percent and the business tax rate from 35 to 25 percent. He said that these tax cuts will help companies grow, which will be good for the job market and the country.

McCain said that if he were elected he would build 45 more nuclear power plants, which would create almost 1 million jobs by the year 2030. He said that America must end its dependence on foreign oil, and move towards more self-sustaining types of energy. He said that America has more coal that Saudi Arabia has oil and that if he were elected he would begin a clean coal energy project.

Small business owners gathered at the 2008 National Small Business Summit held at the Grand Hyatt Hotel. Guest speaker William D. Novelli, Chief Executive Officer of American Association of Retired Persons (AARP) doled out alarming statistics saying that only a fifth of American workers have a defined pension plan and only half of all Americans have money in their retirement fund. Kathleen Casey-Kirschling, the woman who is recognized as the first of 78 million baby boomers, just received her Social Security retirement benefit. (more…)