The Obama administration recently announced plans for a Job Summit.
Quote:
The Obama administration announced plans Monday to hold a forum on jobs and economic growth at the White House on Dec. 3, after which the president will go on the road to demonstrate his concern about the nation's rising jobless rate.
With the nation's unemployment rate at its highest level in 26 years, President Obama plans to bring together CEOs, small business owners and financial experts to sound out ideas for continuing to expand the economy and create jobs.
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44 - White House announces a jobs summit on Dec. 3
I thought we could have our own job summit right here, and who knows maybe we can affect policy.
As a small business owner the obstacles I face when I consider adding employees are:
Taxes - I not only face the cost to employ a person in terms of their wage but I also face payroll taxes, unemployment taxes and work comp premiums (not technically a tax but I no choice but to pay the premiums). Many employees don't realize how much these taxes are, not to mention the costs to file and pay all these taxes.
Costs - Additional employees require office space, equipment (in my case a desk, phone, computer, etc), and training. These costs can be thousands of dollars before the employee does anything to help the bottom line.
Time- In order to hire someone I have to invest a lot of time in advertising, reviewing applicants, scheduling interviews, conducting interviews, checking backgrounds, negotiating pay, making an offer and coordinating initial employment issues.
Risks - In order to hire someone I run the risk of making a mistake that could be a violation of state/local or federal employment law. I could be sued for legitimate reason or for no legitimate reason but in either case I face the costs of defense.
Being a small employer every person I hire initially wants to work for me, but I always face the risk of them leaving when a more "sexy" employer comes calling. In that case I wasted a lot of time and money in hiring the person and training.
Every time I hire a new person I have the risk that they don't really give a sh*t, and they can easily ruin customer relationships that may have taken years to develop with a single act.
Uncertainty - I don't know what state/local or federal mandates will be applied to me in the future that may dramatically increase my costs or cause me to go out of business.
Minimum Wage - I would love to give young people an opportunity to learn my business or just to get some experience, but they don't know anything and would add no value to my business. If there was a way for me to give them this opportunity without it costing so much I would do it.
Credit Availability - When I grow my business my receipts don't match my expenses. Expenses for the increased activity comes first and having access to credit is needed to bridge the gap. Currently, new credit is not being made available to small businesses and existing credit has been reduced and is at a higher cost.
Given the above, hiring an additional person is the absolute last thing I want to do. If there is any way for me to get by without hiring a new person, I would do it.
So as a starting point the above are some obstacles, I am sure other businesses face other obstacles or share some that I have. So, lets put those obstacles on the table and discuss solutions. Also, there may be some solutions for creating jobs that don't involve small business (I don't see how, but I am open) we can put those on the table as well.