By Jim Hightower, Creators Syndicate
I've got to hand it to Washington's Republican policymakers. They've come up with a truly remarkable way that, they promise, will vastly expand the number of small businesses in America. Great!
This is personal for me, for I grew up in a family that had a Main Street business in small-town Texas, so I know how hard it is for little guys to battle the raw monopoly power of corporate chains. Thus, I cheered the GOP ... until I learned that their small business proposal is just another big business scam.
Far from actually increasing the number of small enterprises, Trump bureaucrats are merely redefining "small" to include BIG. For example, the Small Business Administration has long categorized a business as small if it had less than $25 million in yearly sales. But they've now jacked that definition up by 1,000%! Indeed, even some billion-dollar giants can now — HOCUS POCUS — qualify as small.
This is much worse than a statistical ruse, for it means that very large outfits with Wall Street backing, Washington lobbyists and slick corporate lawyers will suddenly take the grants, contracts and other government benefits intended to advance genuine Main Street innovators and competitors. In short, the GOP's cynical scheme is using the small business label to overpower those very enterprises. It's a deliberate rigging of the rules by today's right-wing government officials to help big business grab public money — increasing the power of corporate elites to eliminate competitors... and further monopolize our economy.
Remember this deceit when Republican congress critters run corporate-financed election ads this fall claiming to "looove" small business. Yeah ... love it to death.
To find out more about Jim Hightower and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators webpage at www.creators.com.
Reprinted with permission from Creators Syndicate
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