Small Business and the $700 Billion Bailout

By Laura Jane Hudson

In September 2008, the Bush Administration laid out a radical bail out plan to compensate for over half-trillion dollars in worthless mortgages and bad debt. The government already has pledged more than $600 billion in the past year to help bail out some of the biggest names in American finance, leaving small business to fin for themselves.

Bush announced that this would be largest government intervention since the Great Depression. If this problem was created by excessive debt and credit, creating more is not going to help. The government bailout plan is creating money out of thin air and has inevitably caused the American dollar to fall against gold, the euro, and petroleum.

Such results of the bailout plan could seriously hurt small business and harm middle class firms as well. MerchantCircle Founder, Ben T. Smith, IV thinks that Washington is not directing their concern to Main Street America. Close to 50 percent of small business owners don't think the bailout plan is going to help. The focus needs to be on Main Street America and the government is seemingly only worried about Wall Street.

As Proof of the Bush Administration's lack of concern for the small business owner, The American Small Business League notes that President Bush has cut the Small Business Administration's (SBA) budget in half, and cut funding and oversight for every program assisting small businesses, including women, minority and veteran-owned firms.

Changes within the bailout plan will probably not be resolved until Obama officially takes office – he, along with elected officials, will be responsible for fixing the plan that Bush put into place.

In his goal to help our economy, Obama is committed to swiftly enacting tax cuts for middle-class Americans. Some of his plans may even pay for themselves – such as an alternative energy. Also, approving universal health insurance and spending more on education would help the economy in the long run. Small business is responsible for more than two-thirds of new job creation, Obama's new Small Business Rescue Plan is another vital move to turn our economy around. It's long overdue that the federal government stepped forward with a plan to support small businesses and owners, after all the billions given to bailout the largest U.S. corporations. If we are going to reestablish our economy we need to do it from the ground up, starting with our foundation – small business.