An end to the credit crunch, less talk of tax increases, and health-care reform without coverage mandates top entrepreneurs’ lists (By Karen E. Klein, June 23, 2009).
Along with resentment about billions in government bailouts to large corporations deemed too big to fail, the issues most commonly mentioned as troubling for small business owners as they contemplate life under the new Obama Administration are the persistent credit crunch, the Administration’s plans for health-care reform, and the possibility of tax increases on top-tier income brackets, experts say.
While many entrepreneurs give President Barack Obama credit for a policy initiative that dropped fees on U.S. Small Business Administration-backed loans and increased the agency’s loan guarantees, they worry that the incentives are not working. “All this recovery money is going out and yet nobody’s lending and we don’t know when they ever will be,” says Margo Dorfman, CEO of the U.S. Women’s Chamber of Commerce. “The businesses we deal with have been around for decades, they’ve been paying their lines of credit as they’re supposed to, but now they’re getting cut off left and right. Our members are saying, ‘Hey, I could grow my business but I can’t get access to capital.’”
Filed under: Business Environment, Funding, Northern Kentucky, entrepreneurship
