Tuesday, July 31, 2012

Billy Long: Obama's small business message is wrong


In his latest newsletter, Seventh District Congressman Billy Long takes issue with President Obama on his recent comments about small businesses.
I recently met with the owners of a bed and breakfast.  They borrowed $400,000 in 1999 and took a chance that their business plan would be successful with a lot of hard work.  Their dream has been successful, as last year they did $2.6 million in sales.

President Obama will be hard pressed to explain to this couple who paid hundreds of thousands of dollars in taxes last year that they did not build their business.

They certainly do not agree with President Obama’s message when he recently said that if you own a small business you did not create it, someone else did.
 
Supporting American Jobs

We all agree that we need to get our nation’s economy growing again in order to create jobs for American families.

Increasing our nation’s exports is one area which will grow the economy and create jobs without costing the taxpayers a dime.  I support free trade because more exports equal more jobs.

I was pleased when Congress finally passed the long-stalled free trade agreements with Colombia, Panama, and South Korea so our farmers and manufacturers have new markets for their products and to be able to provide Missourians more opportunities for new jobs.

U. S. farmers and livestock producers feed the world, which is why these agreements are vital to our agriculture community.  These free trade agreements will further agriculture’s role in trading with other nations.

As a freshman, I was humbled to serve on the Free Trade Task Force led by Rep. David Dreier of California. The task force was created to promote free trade and to help get the free trade agreements with Colombia, Panama, and South Korea passed through Congress.

Building off the experience of the Free Trade Task Force, I recently led the effort to rally my freshman class to support Permanent Normal Trade Relations (PNTR) with Russia and sent a letter to the president highlighting our support. After nearly two decades of negotiations, Russia is poised to join the World Trade Organization (WTO) this summer and without repealing a Cold War-era trade restriction American businesses will be at a disadvantage to international competitors.  While the U.S. already trades with Russia, the repeal of the Jackson-Vanik provision would level the playing field for U.S. exports after Russia joins the WTO.  The president has shown an interest in increasing American exports and the purpose of this letter was to show the president that 73 members of the Republican freshman class are willing to work on this issue that will help support American jobs.  Some media in this country like to portray the freshman class as a group who will not work in a bipartisan spirit for the benefit of America.  We can put those portrayals to rest.
I will continue to support efforts to boost trade opportunities for American manufacturers and businesses. This is about doing what is right for our country and supporting efforts to create jobs for American families.
 
Economic Uncertainty

Our country is racing towards a fiscal cliff that could cause irrefutable damage to our country and further hurt an economic recovery that is needed to create jobs for Americans.

On January 1, 2013, the current tax rates expire and all Americans will watch as Uncle Sam takes more money from their paychecks and sends it to Washington.  In 2009 President Obama said that you don’t raise taxes in a recession.  Now that our country is speeding towards this fiscal cliff and has yet to recover from the recession, he has changed his message.

The constant threat of out-of-control spending, higher taxes, and excessive regulation from Washington has resulted in some of the worst unemployment since the Great Depression.  We need to get the government out of the way so businesses can create jobs and get this country back on track.

Cutting federal spending and balancing the budget has been a top priority since I first came to Congress.  Congress needs to work to combat the record deficit and ballooning national debt, which at last count amounted to an astounding $15.9 trillion.  For too long, Congress has spent the hard-earned American tax dollars without considering the consequences.  Washington needs to take a look in the mirror and realize that the old way of conducting business simply won’t work anymore.  Besides balancing the budget, we need to reform our tax code and fix programs like Medicare and Social Security that will go insolvent and structurally collapse if they are not corrected.

Last year, Republicans were willing to consider tax code reform that would have reduced loopholes, made it easier for taxpayers to file, and increased economic growth.  Republicans wanted to increase revenue without increasing taxes.  Democrats never put a penny’s worth of reforms on the table that would slow the unsustainable growth of the drivers of the debt - government spending on entitlements - without insisting upon a massive tax increase.

The fiscal cliff our nation is fast approaching is avoidable, but when one party digs in and demands to raise taxes on families and small businesses, our nation’s number one job creators, it makes it hard to steer away from this cliff.

I will continue to work to ensure that you get to keep more of the money you worked hard to earn.  Washington does not have a revenue problem; Washington has a spending problem, as evident in the fact that Washington is spending 42 percent more than it takes from taxpayers.  Washington needs to take a page from American families and learn to live on a budget.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Billy didn't even build his own business. His customers did.

Customers always build any legitimate, lawful business. The only folks who can actually build their own are counterfeiters, forgers, and thieves, and they belong in jail.