In case you didn’t already know.
From Michelle Malkin.
As I promised you on Tuesday, today’s column takes a closer look at how small businesses are getting whacked by skyrocketing unemployment insurance tax hikes across the country. Friends of mine here in Colorado Springs first alerted me to their massive bills, which have arrived over the past two weeks. Business owners from several other states have written me with similar horror stories — and I’ve included some of their experiences below. It’s yet another example of how the hidden Obama jobs death toll is wreaking havoc on America’s wealth producers.
One important point of clarification: The extra 13 months will not be tacked on to the existing 99 weeks’ package. Rather, the current proposal would extend eligibility for this basket of benefits until the end of 2011.
……For an excellent overview and analysis of the UI program’s flaws, fiscal problems, and needed changes, see the April 2010 testimony of UI expert Douglas Holmes here (PDF). He concludes: “The status of the slowly recovering economy dictates that, although the state and federal trust funds are insolvent, we must first do no harm to discourage job creation and economic recovery.” If only “Do No Harm” were a Washington mandate.
……There is no such thing as a “free” government benefit. Ask small-business owners who are footing skyrocketing bills for bottomless jobless benefits. While politicians in Washington negotiate a deal to provide welcome temporary payroll, income and estate tax relief to America’s workers, struggling employers wonder how long they’ll have to pay for the compassion of others — and whether they can survive.
……In an interminable money shuffle, these bankrupt state unemployment insurance funds are now borrowing money from the feds, whose own regular unemployment benefits account and extended benefits account are both in the red. Washington is relying on transfers from the federal general revenue fund to cover loan obligations related to all these hemorrhaging accounts.
Who pays? Dentists, tavern owners, maid services, mom-and-pop shops — small businesses that are the backbone of the American economy. In my home state of Colorado, small and mid-size firms have been saddled with eye-popping unemployment insurance bills that have doubled, tripled and more in the past year. The businesses that have the lowest claims histories are getting punished the most to make up the jobless benefits fund deficit.
Greg Howard, owner of McCabe’s Tavern in Colorado Springs, told the Colorado Springs Gazette his bill spiked a whopping 600 percent. “It’s enough to T you off a little bit,” Howard told the newspaper. “The dollar amount isn’t tremendous, but it’s going up six times.”
A small commercial painting contractor told me this week that her nine-person company’s 1st quarter UI bill has gone from $1,000 to more than $6,500 over the past three years. “It’s killing us!” she told me. “How can we hire additional employees? This is a big increase in addition to the health insurance annual increases, etc. We had to reduce our employees’ wages by 10 percent this year, and who knows when we will be able to bump them back up?”
Lon Gibson, owner of Legalpool, Inc., told me how perverse unemployment insurance incentives led him to shut down his business in Philadelphia:
“We placed legal staff, especially temporary secretaries and paralegals. Part of our business was to place a secretary at a law firm for a short period of time. … Invariably, however, the temp would apply for unemployment benefits after the assignment. The agency would make a profit of $6 to $10 an hour from the assignment. Later, the bill would come in from unemployment for the temp and thus eliminate the profit we made from the temp! Ultimately, unless the temp didn’t file, the money we made on the temp was completely subtracted by required unemployment payments. It was exactly like, to use a football analogy, making a 10-yard gain and consistently having it eliminated by a holding penalty. … I can only imagine what other agencies are going through now with this administration.”
More: http://michellemalkin.com/2010/12/08/small-biz-killers-who-pays-for-jobless-benefits/
Democrats, in their quest to erradicate the “evil rich” have all but decimated our economy.
There are basic tenets of economics that Dems fail to understand: By cutting taxes and spending and allowing free market capitalism (consumers and entreprenuers) to separate the wheat from the chaff, it strengthens the economy and creates jobs.
You do not reward failure with taxpayer-funded bailouts and penalize success with more taxes.
You cannot spend your way out of a deficit.
Over 4 million jobs have been lost during Obama’s tenure, so far. The number currently stands at 15.1 million; that’s over 10%. The current official numbers don’t include those who simply stopped looking for work and ran out of unemployment benefits. That puts it closer to 15%.
THE ANNOINTED ONE thinks everything is hunky dory:
“This tax package does a couple of things immediately for economic growth in Florida. Number one, for those folks looking for work right now, it extends their unemployment benefits.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2010/12/14/obama_unemployment_benefits_biggest_boost_to_the_economy.html
Only an absolute moron (far left/socialist Democrat) could possibly interpret unemployment benefits as a “boost” to the economy.
Last I checked unemployment benefits don’t cover all of life’s expenses. Ya know, things like rent, mortgage, food, gas, utilities, and car payments. Receiving a tax-payer subsidized check isn’t the same as being a productive citizen who actually contibutes to and helps sustain a healthy, strong economy. In other words, it’s a fucking drain.
He is just too fucking stupid beyond words. If GW had said something like this, Queef Olberdouche, Chrissy Matthews, and HuffPo would have broken out in hives.
Related articles:
http://www.gop.com/index.php/briefing/comments/obama_by_the_numbers
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm