Jackson Free Press

Good piece by Stacy Mitchell, a leader on "Think Local" issues and author of the book "Big Box Swindle." At issue here is whether the U.S. Chamber of Commerce (as distinct from local chambers of commerce) has any real interest in small business issues. The US CoC is a national organization famous for spending millions each election cycle on largely conservative causes, including electing anti-plantiff judges in Mississippi and anti-healthcare-reform politicians in this past cycle. (According to Mitchell, the US CoC spent $75 million on this past mid-term election.)

The fundamental problem is that the US CoC has a tendency to push "big business" needs over small business needs, although it claims it represents the 3 million businesses that pay dues to pretty much any local chamber out there.

The JFP, for instance, is a Chamber member in part to get ChamberPlus benefits for our employees and in part because we think our *local* Chambers often to the right thing. We rather emphatically do not support much of the US CoC such as the repeal of HCR, which would, among other things, offer tax credits on healthcare premiums and potentially lower premiums by creating more demand and more competition within the insurance marketplace.

The U. S. Chamber is not the "voice of business." It is the voice of a few giant corporations, which use the Chamber to push their political agenda, all the while cloaking their self-interest behind an image of millions of small businesses.

The Chamber's real allegiance is obvious in its lobbying. Among its top priorities this year, the Chamber spent millions lobbying to weaken the health care bill and has now filed suit to block the law, even though 4 million small businesses stand to gain a sizable tax credit to offset the cost of providing health insurance to their employees. The Chamber's other top issue was the financial reform bill. There it did the bidding of big banks, whose recklessness has sunk countless small businesses and which, even now, continue to strangle the supply of credit on which entrepreneurs depend.

This one is particularly galling:

Over 90 percent of the television ads the Chamber ran during this election season attacked Democratic candidates and praised Republicans. The Chamber insists that its support for the GOP simply reflects the views of small business owners, who are naturally conservative and share with their larger rivals a hostility toward government.

As Mitchell points out, part registration of small business owners is about 1/3 Democrat, 1/3 Republican, 1/3 Independent. Hardly 90% GOP.

Solution? Let's build an Independent Business Alliance. Some of us have already met to discuss it, and if you're interested, shoot me an e-mail at todd at jacksonfreepress dot com. IBAs are cropping up around the country to truly represent the interests of small businesses, and now -- during a time when small businesses are truly the most promising source of hope for economic recovery and job creation in post-BigBox America -- is the time for those businesses to organize.

Previous Comments

ID

161401

Comment

Todd, I respect you and Donna for starting a small business and providing a second voice in Jackson. We agree that the the Chamber of Commerce speaks largely for big business and that small business needs its own voice. The largest most effective such organization of which I am aware is the National Federation of Independent Businesses (NFIB); it appears to have an active chapter here http://www.nfib.com/mississippi. After some investigation you may decide that they are not quite what you had in mind (check their list of political victories against your policy preferences). You may wish to amend your call to action to that of forming a liberal or Democratic Party focused voice of small business. NFIB is under funded relative to the Chamber (big business has more discretionary funds and the resources to hire full time lobbyists). I suspect you will have a greater difficulty achieving substantial funding and membership for a small business advocacy group with a liberal agenda. In my experience, the owners and managers of successful, high-growth small businesses tend to be predominantly conservative to libertarian on economic issues; less so on social issues.

Author

RichardASun

Date

2011-01-01T16:28:59-06:00