Small firms say regulation is fastest-growing concern
It’s been exactly three and a half years since Barack Obama was inaugurated, and here are two things that folks on the left have been saying about the economy every day since then: It’s Bush’s fault, and the problem is a lack of aggregate demand.
Here’s what small businesses have to say about the situation:
Chart by Dan Clifton at Strategas Research, via the AEIdeas blog
Keeping in mind that these are what small firms are “most concerned” about, meaning many likely have concerns to varying degrees about all three, a few things jump out at me:
1. In 2005, these three concerns accounted for a little more than one-third of small firms’ biggest worries. Today, they combine for about 60 percent. That suggests to me that these firms have less time and energy to devote to specific concerns about growing their business.
2. After shooting to the top in the second half of 2008, concerns about sales plateaued for about two years. Those concerns have been falling pretty steadily for the past year and a half.
3. Concerns about regulation, which more or less mirrored those about sales from 2005 to the start of 2008, began a steady ascent in 2009 and have almost doubled since then.
4. Concerns about taxes have remained fairly steady over these years.
5. At the beginning of 2009, the sum of concerns about regulation and those about sales was in the neighborhood of 40 percent — pretty much the same as today. But the division between them is starkly different: Whereas there were three small firms concerned about sales for every one worried about regulation then, now the two are dead even. In other words, worries about sales have been gradually replaced by worries about regulation.
6. If current trend lines continue, both taxes and regulation will soon rank higher among small firms’ concerns than sales.
Even if one wants to credit Obama’s “stimulus” package with the decrease in worries about sales — totally ignoring the effects of the Federal Reserve’s ultra-loose monetary policy — this graph clearly shows why improved demand hasn’t shifted the economy out of neutral: Increased regulation has stifled the recovery we might have had.
Small firms are generally credited with the bulk of job creation in this country. So the question this information puts to voters is: Which candidate do you expect to do more about the most pressing problems faced by small firms — Barack Obama or Mitt Romney?
– By Kyle Wingfield
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575 comments Add your comment
Michael H. Smith
July 22nd, 2012
3:59 pm
jezel
If you are talking to me about limited government you are wasting your time. I more dogmatic on limiting government than you are that I can assure you.
By the way, Federalist papers 41 and 45 speaking directly to limiting the powers of the Federal government, it ain’t just a summation my friend. And it was mostly codified under Article 1 Section 8 of the Constitution.
Michael H. Smith
July 22nd, 2012
4:04 pm
Americans were opposed to government in general.
I have to absolutely disagree with that statement. We are not and neither were the founders of this nation anti-government anarchist. They and I opposes a strong centralized government with omnipotent powers like the King of England held over them. Which if you ask me, we again are not very far from becoming likened unto once again as an oligarchy.
I Report (-: You Whine )-: mmm, mmmm, mmmmm! Just sayin...
July 22nd, 2012
4:13 pm
Allow me to finish JDW’s Lincoln quote-
In all that the people can individually do as well for themselves, government ought not to interfere.
Just sayin…
MarkV
July 22nd, 2012
4:14 pm
jezel @3:20 pm
“MarkV…If you disagree with the statement … that the role of the government is to do for us what we as individuals cannot do for ourselves,”
Where did I or why would I disagree?
“Why would we want a government to do for us what we CAN do for ourselves? “
Because there are things that “the government” can do better. Notice that although we use the term “the government,” we do not mean it literally. For instance, the government” usually does not build roads, even those that are “government built.” Rather, it contracts private companies to do the building, but the government has an essential role. Even when the actual workers are in fact government employees, I wonder how many people would argue that, for example, employees of CDC are “government’ and therefore we should not let them do what they do. Yes, we COULD have hundreds of individual private companies try to do the same, but would that be a wise thing?
Michael H. Smith
July 22nd, 2012
4:25 pm
In case anyone wonders what type of omnipotent(fascist regulating) government these few leftist “Social Democrats” on Kyle’s blog want you and I to live under, take a relaxing read on the topic of “Social Democracy”. (It parallels some of Karl Marx thinking.)
Social democracy is a political ideology that considers itself to be a form of reformist democratic socialism.[1] Social democracy rejects the “either/or” polarization interpretation of capitalism versus socialism.[2] It claims that fostering a progressive evolution of capitalism will gradually result in the evolution of capitalist economy into socialist economy.[3] Social democracy argues that all citizens should be legally entitled to certain social rights. These are made up of universal access to public services such as: education, health care, workers’ compensation, and other services including child care and care for the elderly.[4] Social democracy is connected with the trade union labour movement and supports collective bargaining rights for workers.[5] Contemporary social democracy advocates freedom from discrimination based on differences of: ability/disability, age, social class, ethnicity, gender, language, race, religion, and sexual orientation.[6] Most social democratic parties are affiliated with the Socialist International.[7]
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_democracy
Hey, it will do everything for you that you cannot do for yourself.
Michael H Smith
July 22nd, 2012
4:31 pm
Hey, it will do everything for you that you cannot do for yourself.
Oops… and I meant to say, it will also do everything to you that you would never to to yourself.
Michael H. Smith
July 22nd, 2012
4:36 pm
Are we all Comrades now, Kyle?
Michael H. Smith
July 22nd, 2012
4:40 pm
Oops…My bad this link will work.
http://www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_democracy
Uh Oh
July 22nd, 2012
4:48 pm
The Fortune 500 is regulated to so bad, they collectively made more income in 2011 than ever before.
FACT
Uh Oh
July 22nd, 2012
4:52 pm
Oh the regs and liberals. The sky is falling. waaaaaaaaaaa
waaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
The 500 largest US companies piled up record profits last year, despite a lackluster economy, and energy giant ExxonMobil ousted Wal-Mart as the biggest revenue maker, Fortune magazine said Monday.
The combined earnings of the Fortune 500 corporations rose 16 percent from 2010 to a record high of $825 billion in 2011, the magazine said.
Raw Story (http://s.tt/1daCK)
I Report (-: You Whine )-: mmm, mmmm, mmmmm! Just sayin...
July 22nd, 2012
4:56 pm
Who’s been talking about the Fortune 500? The conversation is about small business.
Try comprehension, you might like it.
Uh Oh
July 22nd, 2012
4:57 pm
I report
I wanted to bring up that issue and I did
Accept it, you might like it
Michael H. Smith
July 22nd, 2012
4:58 pm
The Fortune 500 is regulated to so bad, they collectively made more income in 2011 than ever before.
And if they all did it legally, so what?
The combined earnings of the Fortune 500 corporations rose 16 percent from 2010
Well gee, 16% is about the average profit margin for the pharmaceutical sector thanks to government regulations on re-importation of FDA approved drugs… good to see the others are catching up so to speak.
Uh Oh
July 22nd, 2012
4:58 pm
This blog is all over the place in terms of topics, so cry to the others who have changed topics and keep your tears,
have a tissue
Mary Elizabeth
July 22nd, 2012
5:03 pm
About the immutability of the U.S. Constitution from Thomas Jefferson’s perspective, from pages 378 – 379 of Saul K. Padover’s book, entitled “Jefferson,” published in 1942 by Konecky & Konecky by special arrangement with Harcourt, Brace & Company. Padover received a doctorate degree in history from the University of Chicago and was a Professor of History at the University of California and at the New School for Social Research in New York City. He was the author of 30 books, six of which were about Jefferson:
————————————————————-
“Thus Jefferson accepted the inevitable. Ultimately the growth of American industrialization led to the ruin of the agricultural South. Even in Jefferson’s lifetime Congress passed a tariff which hit him and his fellow agrarians hard. Jefferson had to pay three times the prewar prices for shirtings, for example.
“Jefferson’s change of position on the subject of industrialization illustrates a basic quality of his mind, that of flexibility. He viewed the world as mutable. In his eyes nothing was permanent and nothing was rigidly fixed. Men changed, institutions changed, ideas changed. There was constant growth, and constant decay. The life cycle applied to nature as well as to institutions. Even the Constitution of the United States, which was the bulwark of American freedom, was not immutable. At the age of seventy-three Jefferson said that the Constitution was not ‘too sacred to be touched’ but was a human institution that should be revised periodically when needed:
“(Jefferson): ‘Some men look at constitutions with sanctimonious reverence and deem them like the arc of the covenant, too sacred to be touched. They ascribe to the men of the preceding age a wisdom more than human, and suppose what they did to be beyond amendment. . . .I know. . . that laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind. . . .As. . . new discoveries are made, new truths disclosed, and manners and opinions change with the change of circumstances, institutions must advance also, and keep pace with the times. We might as well require a man to wear still the coat which fitted him when a boy, as civilized society to remain ever under the regimen of their barbarous ancestors. . . .Each generation. . . has. . .a right to choose for itself the form of government it believes most promotive of its own happiness. . . .a solemn opportunity of doing this every nineteen or twenty years should be provided by the constitution.’
“His (Jefferson’s) conclusion in the matter of laws and institutions was that they perpetually subject to change for the benefit of humanity. ‘Nothing then,’ he told Major John Cartwright in 1824, ‘is unchangeable but the inherent and unalienable rights of man.’ ”
(Note: The above information from Padover’s book was footnoted to reference, “Notices, Letters, etc. Respecting the Library Manuscripts of Thomas Jefferson,” typescript, Library of Congress, 1898, vol. 7, page 359.)
Uh Oh
July 22nd, 2012
5:03 pm
MHS
I say forget the regs. Just put the medicine on the market
Guess we need more incidents like the one a week or so ago where the pharmaceutical was fined a huge some for FRAUD.
http://www.thirdage.com/news/glaxo-smith-kline-to-pay-3b-for-health-fraud_07-02-2012
Bet they only did this because of the regs, right?
What would they have done without any regs?
Michael H. Smith
July 22nd, 2012
5:04 pm
No tears from me just because companies and individuals are still making money before government regulates them out of making their profits. It would make me happier if a lot of those government regulations that protect big business from small business competition were gone. whimper whimper
Uh Oh
July 22nd, 2012
5:06 pm
MHS
If you are not in agreement with the laws and regs of an industry, do not invest your money into that industry directly or indirectly.
Supply and demand. If there is a demand, some company will meet the demand. Period, plain and simple
Michael H Smith
July 22nd, 2012
5:08 pm
Uh Oh
Forgot how to read you mean?
Like this part in my statement: re-importation of “FDA approved drugs”
Well gee, 16% is about the average profit margin for the pharmaceutical sector thanks to government regulations on re-importation of FDA approved drugs… good to see the others are catching up so to speak.
Michael H. Smith
July 22nd, 2012
5:11 pm
If you are not in agreement with the laws and regs of an industry, do not invest your money into that industry directly or indirectly.
Supply and demand. If there is a demand, some company will meet the demand. Period, plain and simple
Oh I don’t but unlike you I never cry when any of the make a legal profit without a regulation protecting it or having secured it. WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA brucie
Michael H. Smith
July 22nd, 2012
5:16 pm
Guess we need more incidents like the one a week or so ago where the pharmaceutical was fined a huge some for FRAUD.
Nah, guess we need more of what I already pointed out many times before now which you didn’t read or chose to ignore then: We need regulators who do their dang jobs and don’t get a regulatory job via the revolving door process to regulate the sector where they were employed in sometimes only a few months earlier.
Uh Oh
July 22nd, 2012
5:22 pm
“We need regulators who do their dang jobs and don’t get a regulatory job via the revolving door process to regulate the sector where they were employed in sometimes only a few months earlier.”
Good luck. Both parties put in their cronies, many who have worked in the industry of question, in ALL of the departments that are doing oversight
jezel
July 22nd, 2012
5:27 pm
Right…we do not need the government doing anything for us.. under any pretense.. that we can do for ourselves.
The question of how much regulation is the debate. If the regulations hinder competition then we do not need them. So we should ask ourselves… how do we create an atmosphere where more oil companies can enter the market….how can we graduate more doctors…how can we create competition among the insurance companies and drug manufactures…what can we do to protect our money in the banks…what do we do with the investment instruments created by Wall street that drive prices up and down.
The only regulations we need are those that stimulate competition in the market. Unfortunately, we as individuals cannot implement this. We can identify them and demand that our elected officials follow through.
RiaW
July 22nd, 2012
5:32 pm
An excellent read if you dare.
Government-business partnerships. A third defining characteristic of economic fascism is that private property and business ownership are permitted, but are in reality controlled by government through a business-government “partnership.” As Ayn Rand often noted, however, in such a partnership government is always the senior or dominating “partner.”
[snip]
Virtually all of the specific economic policies advocated by the Italian and German fascists of the 1930s have also been adopted in the United States in some form, and continue to be adopted to this day. Sixty years ago, those who adopted these interventionist policies in Italy and Germany did so because they wanted to destroy economic liberty, free enterprise, and individualism. Only if these institutions were abolished could they hope to achieve the kind of totalitarian state they had in mind.
Many American politicians who have advocated more or less total government control over economic activity have been more devious in their approach. They have advocated and adopted many of the same policies, but they have always recognized that direct attacks on private property, free enterprise, self-government, and individual freedom are not politically palatable to the majority of the American electorate. Thus, they have enacted a great many tax, regulatory, and income-transfer policies that achieve the ends of economic fascism, but which are sugar-coated with deceptive rhetoric about their alleged desire only to “save” capitalism.
American politicians have long taken their cue in this regard from Franklin D. Roosevelt, who sold his National Recovery Administration (which was eventually ruled unconstitutional) on the grounds that “government restrictions henceforth must be accepted not to hamper individualism but to protect it.”[40] In a classic example of Orwellian doublespeak, Roosevelt thus argued that individualism must be destroyed in order to protect it.
http://www.thefreemanonline.org/columns/economic-fascism/
As Wingfield mentioned, it’s the difference between pro-business and pro-market.
Unleash the free market.
Michael H. Smith
July 22nd, 2012
5:38 pm
Uh Oh
July 22nd, 2012
5:22 pm
Well, you just stripped away any value in your argument for regulations with that good luck comment.
It’s going to take a great deal more than luck to set right the regulatory policies this country actually needs in place and the right people doing those regulatory jobs. I don’t care much for Gub’Ment workers, particularly unionized ones, but I care even less than that about having to do without the few government employees and the few well needed regulations I actually must have to protect my rights and property and that of all others.
I’m for a limited federal government not states of anarchy.
md
July 22nd, 2012
5:43 pm
“The combined earnings of the Fortune 500 corporations rose 16 percent from 2010 to a record high of $825 billion in 2011, the magazine said.”
And those same corps laid off 850k in 2009 alone……and have been cutting steadily since.
Profit is a reflection of income minus expenses…….I wouldn’t be tooting this horn too loud without looking at the overall picture first.
Uh Oh
July 22nd, 2012
5:47 pm
MHS
Well is you vote Republican then you are aware that Republican Presidents are just as apt to have their folks place industry people over and in departments that regulate the industries they came from. You will be able to produce not a thing that says different
So if you are against it as you say and vote Republican, you are being a hypocrite on that issue.
Nothing more, nothing less
Uh Oh
July 22nd, 2012
5:49 pm
“if you….”
Excuse me
Uh Oh
July 22nd, 2012
5:53 pm
md
I’m just saying it is what it is. Didn’t praise it or knock it.
md
July 22nd, 2012
5:56 pm
“I’m just saying it is what it is. Didn’t praise it or knock it.”
Well…the talking point put out by the dems does the same thing…..I’m just laying out the rest of the info so people can see the whole picture……since you didn’t.
Uh Oh
July 22nd, 2012
6:01 pm
md
It’s all about supply and demand along the resources it takes to meet that demand.
Dusty
July 22nd, 2012
6:04 pm
Well, I am perfectly satisfied that Kyle is correct to say that small firms say regulation is fastest growing concern for them. I don’t doubt that they have other concerns too but, if the government would mind its business instead of theirs, small business will succeed.
I do wish I was a expert in consitutional law, all government agencies, the national economy and could write a treatise on Jefferson (every two weeks) but I just have to rely on newspapers, books, TV and dear Google. So it is good to have so many experts available here. Yes!!
But I am getting a bit bored here on Sunday evening. Did any of you watch that record breaking game with the Braves yesterday? What a game! Read Zell Miller’s comments? (He’s 80 years old with 100 year old knees, he said.) He’s still interesting. President Obama and Romney in mourning as they should be. What a tragedy in Colorado. And locally, the wandering raccoons are eating green figs off my tree. Now that takes a strong digestive tract if I do say so.
Someday I will get back on topic. Just don’t count on it..
Mary Elizabeth
July 22nd, 2012
6:08 pm
Many people in the nation today believe, as did Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt, that governmental social programs which serve the general welfare or “common good” of the public, such as Social Security, Medicare (later established), public education, and the recent Affordable Health Act, aka Obamacare, do serve the American people’s best interest, and that these programs within government are reflections of government function at its highest level – by serving the human rights of all of its citizens.
The words of Thomas Jefferson, which I have excerpted from my 5:03 p.m. post, above:
“Each generation. . . has. . .a right to choose for itself the form of government it believes most promotive of its own happiness. . .”
From Saul Padover’ book, highlighted from my same 5:03 p.m. post:
“His (Jefferson’s) conclusion in the matter of laws and institutions was that they perpetually subject to change for the benefit of humanity. ‘Nothing then,’ he told Major John Cartwright in 1824, ‘is unchangeable but the inherent and unalienable rights of man.’ ”
FDR believed that the government could serve to further the human rights of all of its citizens, as he outlined in his final State of the Union Address, that part of which is often referred to as FDR’s concept of “America’s Second Bill of Rights.” See link below:
http://www.fdrheritage.org/bill_of_rights.htm
=========================================================
I realize that my thoughts, above, are not consistent with those who are presently having a discussion about the role of government on this blog. I simply wanted to get my thoughts published for readers to consider another point-of-view regarding the role of government. I am not interested in debating others this evening on this issue; I simply desired a variant position to be presented.
Thank you.
md
July 22nd, 2012
6:08 pm
“It’s all about supply and demand along the resources it takes to meet that demand.”
It’s about much more than just supply and demand……it’s also about getting a good or service to market to meet that demand, and the costs associated with it.
Demand means absolutely nothing if there is no product to meet it.
And the reason our jobs have been going overseas in the past few decades is because that demand has been for the lowest priced good consumers can get their hands on……unfortunately, those prices can’t be met with the cost of labor in this country. So goods will continue to be made overseas where the cost of labor is a fraction of what it is here….or, the american consumer decides it wants to pay a little more to employe their neighbors……..
MarkV
July 22nd, 2012
6:11 pm
jezel @5:27 pm
“If the regulations hinder competition then we do not need them.
Yeah, I am sure the competition will get us clean air and water.
md
July 22nd, 2012
6:13 pm
” that governmental social programs which serve the general welfare or “common good” of the public, such as Social Security, Medicare (later established), public education, and the recent Affordable Health Act, aka Obamacare, do serve the American people’s best interest, and that these programs within government are reflections of government function at its highest level – by serving the human rights of all of its citizens.”
Since you don’t care to debate it, then I’ll just add my 2 cents:
And what good are the above mentioned programs if the cost of said programs becomes a burden too great to supply said programs and instead results in the opposite of the desired affects??
Simply put, if those programs bankrupt the nation, they’ve done much more harm than good.
MarkV
July 22nd, 2012
6:15 pm
md @6:08 pm
“Demand means absolutely nothing if there is no product to meet it.”
Talk about putting a cart in front of a horse. The product results from demand (either actually expressed or perceived), not the other way round.
md
July 22nd, 2012
6:20 pm
And the numbers, just in case one cares….62% of the budget currently goes just to entitlements….does not include aca.
40% of budget is currently borrowed……….
Dusty
July 22nd, 2012
6:23 pm
md @6:13
You were correct when you said “If those programs (government) bankrupt a nation, they’ve done much more harm than good”. Absolutely!
The trouble is, seems liberals cannot visualize a country going broke. It seems impossible for them. They cannot believe that the golden giveaways and costly containments can far outcost any amount of money this country can produce. Such an attitude suffocates us slowly but surely..
md
July 22nd, 2012
6:24 pm
“Talk about putting a cart in front of a horse. The product results from demand (either actually expressed or perceived), not the other way round.”
Not true…….
How did people even know they wanted an iphone until Jobs un-veiled it?
Same with the microwave oven…..and more products than I can count.
Products are put on the market every day, some make it and some don’t…..hence the invention of the info-mercial.
Uh Oh
July 22nd, 2012
6:25 pm
md
And it still is supply and demand. If you want to get technical about the details, so be it, however it is still supply and demand.
If there is not a current supply, some one, some company in some country will provide it. May not be on “demand”, but overall the demand will be met, one way or another
md
July 22nd, 2012
6:26 pm
“The trouble is, seems liberals cannot visualize a country going broke.”
I think a few might be capable now……the ones that live in San Bernadino, Mammoth Lakes, and Stockton……..if not, they truly do have their head in the sand.
Uh Oh
July 22nd, 2012
6:27 pm
“seems liberals cannot visualize a country going broke.”
Reagan and Bush Jr are not considered liberals. They loved to spend just like most in government including Democrats
You are dismissed for being biased and one sided in regards to a spending issues that has plagued the inner core of both parties for years.
md
July 22nd, 2012
6:29 pm
“but overall the demand will be met, one way or another”
Only if there exists the capacity to meet that demand.
Oil is finite…….we will never ever meet the demand if it outpaces supply.
Uh Oh
July 22nd, 2012
6:30 pm
md
You can live in an “if this, if that” world if you like.
Your choice
md
July 22nd, 2012
6:32 pm
“Reagan and Bush Jr are not considered liberals. They loved to spend just like most in government including Democrats”
This is what I call the spousal argument……both spouses complaining that the other ran up the credit card. The problem with that, is the balance is still due regardless………
It matters not how we got here, the spending has to stop.
Dusty
July 22nd, 2012
6:34 pm
UH OH 6:27
You are dismissed for trying to blame Bush for an Obama problem. Bush is not here running up a bigger debt. OBAMA IS.
Now go sit in the corner.
MarkV
July 22nd, 2012
6:34 pm
md @6:24 pm
“How did people even know they wanted an iphone until Jobs un-veiled it?
Same with the microwave oven…..and more products than I can count.”
That is exactly the “perceived demand” I wrote about. No company will make a product for which it does not expect a demand.
md
July 22nd, 2012
6:37 pm
“No company will make a product for which it does not expect a demand.”
Perceived demand has been the downfall of many a product………..it’s called an educated guess………
Uh Oh
July 22nd, 2012
6:38 pm
Dusty
Didn’t blame Bush for Obama. Obama is a Democrat. I included Democrats in my post as big spenders
I merely mentioned Reagan and Bush jr to show that the FACTS are both parties have been known to be big spenders.
If you can’t see that and are that blind, your problem and ignorance. Not mine