By Jack Faris
Moonlighting-working two jobs to make ends meet-is more than a time-honored American tradition; it’s a necessity for a substantial share of the nation’s workforce. According to the most recent employment-situation summary released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 7.2 million Americans hold more than one job.
The federal government doesn’t collect statistics on how many of the nation’s 25 million small-business owners are forced to juggle the equivalent of two jobs most of the time. They don’t do it to earn extra income, but to protect what they’ve already gained against a never-ending list of government regulations, tax schemes and ill-conceived, but politically popular programs that gnaw incessantly at their cash registers and bank accounts.
And while these late-night-oil-burning entrepreneurs are certainly not eager to add anything else to their time-crunched schedules, President Bush’s State of the Union message was a clear call for them to put in some extra hours. Only this notice from the nation’s chief executive was a plea for help to roll back some of those anti-free-enterprise initiatives that have gobbled up far too much of the American business sector’s precious time and financial resources.
Fitting a third job into their already long days won’t be easy, but by becoming grassroots political activists at every opportunity between now and Election Day 2006, small-business owners can have a major, favorable impact on their struggling enterprises.
The president has made it very clear that he understands the important role of entrepreneurs in the nation’s economy. Announcing his Fiscal Year 2006 budget, he specifically pledged to boost small-business owners and their employees, calling on Congress to make health care more affordable and accessible to Americans through the enactment of Small-Business Health Plans (formerly called AHPs).
These plans are a key priority for the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB). Passage of legislation such as the Small Business Health Fairness Act would make health insurance more affordable for small-business owners by allowing them to band together across state lines through bona-fide trade associations to buy insurance at lower premium costs for themselves and their employees. Main Street supporters U.S. Reps. John Boehner of Ohio, Sam Johnson of Texas, Nydia Velasquez of New York and Albert Wynn of Maryland, recently introduced the Small Business Health Fairness Act in the U.S. House. U.S. Sens. Olympia Snowe of Maine, Jim Talent of Missouri and Christopher “Kit” Bond of Missouri have introduced companion legislation in the Senate.
The cost of health insurance has been ranked the No. 1 problem for small-business owners since 1986, according to the NFIB Research Foundation’s “Small Business Problems and Priorities,” which reports on the most pressing issues facing small business. While very important, it is just one of the issues that need attention.
The president also promised to focus Congress’s attention on the pressing need to make permanent the tax cuts that were passed in 2001 and 2003, to repeal the “Death Tax,” and to reverse the upward trend in frivolous lawsuits.
By moonlighting as letter writers, e-mail messengers and visitors to their elected officials’ offices to help them promote these crucial small-business agenda items, America’s over-worked, excessively-taxed and red-tape tangled entrepreneurs could, in the long-term, reduce the moonlighting they’re now required to do to hold the government at bay.
–Jack Faris is president of NFIB (the National Federation of Independent Business), the nation’s largest small-business advocacy group. A non-profit, non-partisan organization founded in 1943, NFIB represents the consensus views of its 600,000 members in Washington, D.C., and all 50 state capitals. More information is available on-line at www.NFIB.com.
