In a speech delivered Wednesday morning, President Barack Obama addresses the need for small businesses to have the ability to access capital so that “they can lend to small businesses in their communities.” (0:29)
At a speech he delivered Wednesday afternoon, President Barack Obama made clear that “it is essential to make more credit available to smaller banks and community financial institutions that these businesses depend on”. (0:21)
Senate Small Business and Entrepreneurship Chairwoman Mary Landrieu (D-La.) speaks about how our nation’s current health care system offers some of the best care in certain U.S. cities, but prices are escalating for small businesses around the country. (0:25)
By Aaron Richardson – Talk Radio News Service
Senate Small Business and Entrepreneurship Chairwoman Mary Landrieu (D-La.) along with Sens. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) and Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) held a roundtable discussion Thursday to tackle the issue of what Congress can do to ensure that heath care reform legislation extends to small businesses.
“Every time I talk to small business people they say we want to do something for our folks. Just don’t make it some kind of federal tax or fee that put’s us out of business.” said Wyden.
Small business representatives from all over the U.S. including Amanda Austin, Director of Federal Policy for the Senate with the National Federation of Independent Businesses and Lin Nichols, the Director of Health Policy for the New America Foundation participated in the discussion.
“We have been very pleased with a lot of the discussion around insurance market reform and really bending the overall cost curve to really find savings at the end of the day that can provide real coverage options. But we need to be very careful about the how we approach the smallest firms and the burdens that we put on them at the end of the day.” said Austin.
When asked by Snowe how Congress plans on creating universal health coverage without any sort of mandate, Nichols replied, “I don’t know how you do it without an individual mandate, you have got to require people to do it. Then you have to make it affordable for people who can’t afford it.”
Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner briefly reflects on the challenges that small businesses which have been reasonable with their borrowing still face. He separate their problems into two categories: those who were unlucky with their choice of bank, and those who are in an industry that typically suffers in times of recession. (0:28)
Congressman Gregg Harper (R-Miss.) talks with TRNS correspondent Christina Lovato at the 2009 House Republican Radio & Blog Row about how middle-class families and small businesses are having to make sacrifices in their budget for bailouts, the G-20 summit and how the U.S. is seeing the highest level of borrowing ever. Harper believes the biggest issue we are going to have is what to do about cap and trade. (06:35)
Senator John McCain’s presidential campaign held a press conference call with economic policy adviser Steve Forbes and senior policy adviser Doug Holtz-Eakin to discuss Senator Obama’s economic plan. Both advisers said that McCain’s economic proposals are opposite that of Obama’s proposals. (more…)
At a health care panel, Senator Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) says the opinion of small business owners is necessary to give the Senate and the new president something to work with when he takes office. (1:07)
