Pro-family and pro-small enterprise is what we should be about, not only pro-tax cuts, if we are to grow out of our troubles

Ryan Streeter

Gallup's latest poll on job creation summarizes many a complicated policy debate with a few straightforward statistics.

These data show that small business, the real driver of job creation in the United States, is still struggling in ways that should give all us grave concern - and policymakers a kick in the seat to tackle the issue broadly, not just with one or two signature policies such as tax cut extensions (as important and critical as those are). 

Here are the 3 main points anyone who cares about job creation in America needs to see:

1. Jobs ARE being created, but mainly in large companies. 42% of businesses with more than 1,000 employees report they are hiring, and 36% with between 100 and 1,000 say they are hiring. 28% of those with between 10 and 100 employees are hiring.
2. By comparison, only 9% of companies with fewer than 10 employees are hiring. They are the only category of businesses that reports trimming more jobs than they are adding.
3. The federal government is also adding more employees than it is letting go, by large margins. They match big business, in fact, with 42% of federal employees reporting that their particular agency is hiring more people than it is letting go.

Now, these survey results are based on a poll of employees. Not all employees will actually know their organization's human resources numbers, though we should expect that employees of small businesses would have the best grasp of their companies' situation. In any case the Gallup results are a clear gauge of a stark reality. Small businesses show that the growth element in our economy is weak and troubled. What is the American economy without its chief engine of growth?

The health of the American economy and society should chiefly be measured by two fundamental units - the family and the small business. 

All of our policy decisions should be assessed by their affect on the health and disposable income of average households and the viability of small enterprises. In my view, this is what differentiates all of us who call ourselves "capitalists" or "proponents of free markets." Policy should bolster the small, energetic units of American growth rather than big banks or big corporations. Every talking head on the right in Washington voices support for small businesses, but not all of them mean it.

Therefore, as Nick Schulz points out on today's Platform, without a broader growth agenda than tax cuts and fiscal stability, the GOP will not gain the political backing it needs to pursue a broader agenda. Which is why it needs to start talking about that agenda now.

A starting point would be tax policy that passes "the Douthat test," as I argued here last week. And then, we need to start laying out the specific elements of an alternative to Obamacare, since many of the best ideas out there - changing the tax treatment of health insurance premiums, allowing purchases across state lines, savings accounts - are favorable to small businesses and families.  

Instead of framing these issues along with tax cuts and deficit reduction as separate issues, they should all be framed together as a pro-family, pro-small enterprise agenda.

Comments

[Josef]

What those calling themselves conservatives have to get through their thick skulls is that even a modestly pro-family, pro-small government agenda will LOSE unless feminist anti-male divorce laws are ended and large scale immigration is ended. These have been the two of the most devastating blows to family life and small government in both America and Britain and any attempts to tinker around the edges with policy gimmicks will fail. The Left thrives on the unravelling of western society through mass divorce and mass immigration and is becoming stronger by the day.