Saving small businesses

By Michelle Saxton
Wednesday, October 20, 2010

Elaine Marshall

Richard Burr

Mike Beitler

 Whether through tax cuts, credit increases or predictable regulations, Congress must help the private sector and small businesses to create good jobs and improve the economy, candidates for the U.S. Senate say.

North Carolina Secretary of State Elaine Marshall, a Democrat, envisions a comprehensive jobs plan that includes tax cuts and credit increases for small businesses to add new lines, new employees or new equipment.

"Small business is really the engine of economic growth," Marshall, a former state senator, said Tuesday, Oct. 19. "And they’re going to be the ones that are going to pull us through and drive this economy."

Closing tax loopholes that encourage outsourcing and ending unfair trade agreements that ship away jobs are needed too, said Marshall, who also previously worked as an attorney and ran a decorating business. She added that long-term goals should include making good investments in education and emphasizing green energy research and jobs.

Taxes and regulation must be more predictable, Republican incumbent Sen. Richard Burr said after a rally in Wilmington on Saturday, Oct. 16.

"Without that we’re not going to get private capital taking the risk because they won’t know what the reward is," said Burr, who worked with a wholesale commercial products company and served 10 years in the U.S House of Representatives before being elected to the Senate in 2004.

"What we’ve proven over the past year and a half is that government just throwing money at the problem is not going to re-inflate employment or get the economy going again," Burr said. "We’ve got to get the private sector believing and investing in the future."

Burr and Marshall are running against Libertarian Michael Beitler, a business professor at the University of North Carolina Greensboro, host of the Internet radio show "Free Markets with Dr. Mike Beitler," and a former chief financial officer in the banking industry.

Beitler, who also does consulting work, said small business owners tell him they will not hire and grow their businesses until they know what regulations they will be dealing with.

"It’s just unclear what’s going to happen next," Beitler said Monday, Oct. 18. "The best thing we could do for them now is to say we’ll put a moratorium on new regulations for the next year or two, and then that way they would know that the goal posts aren’t going to be moved in the middle of the game."

Different views

Marshall has criticized Burr’s record on certain bills, including his vote last month against a small -business lending bill, which has since passed.

"He voted against the help that small business wants and our bankers want because they need the credit," Marshall said. "They’ve got customers out there looking for loans … customers that they feel are valid customers with a good business plan."

Burr expressed concern over establishing a new $30 billion lending facility, which he said has been questioned by the Congressional Oversight Panel and means more government involvement in the private sector.

"This would have been a pretty good bill if we had just kept it simple by extending and expanding the loan programs currently available through the Small Business Administration, and enhancing loan fee reductions," Burr had said previously in a news release.

Beitler, who considers himself conservative on fiscal issues and liberal on social issues, said he is running to provide a choice other than the same old party line message.

"When I look at (Senator) Burr and (Secretary) Marshall I have nothing against them as individuals; we get along well offstage," Beitler said. "But I just don’t see how anybody can get excited about either one of them."

Beitler’s goal is to reach the double digits on Election Day.

"If we can get 10 percent or more, we’re now a force to be reckoned with," Beitler said. "The Dems and the Republicans can’t ignore us."

Policy changes

All three candidates had some concerns about recent health care reform.

"It needs to be repealed," Burr said after Saturday’s rally. "It needs to be replaced with something that focuses on addressing costs."

Without question, people want to see others getting health care, Beitler said, but the nation must address how to stimulate the supply of health care practitioners that would be needed to meet more demand of services.

"We’re not doing anything to incentivize people to go into the health care professions–doctors, nurses and technicians and so forth," Beitler said, adding that he favors offering incentives and benefits to potential health care workers similar to those offered to people who serve in the military.

"If they go through the system and get their certification and then work in the field for a while we would waive their tuition or something of that nature," Beitler said.

Marshall agreed that costs, particularly for premiums and the delivery of health care, must come down and that other fixes need to be made, but she argued the bill needs some time to get going.

"The benefits of electronic records information technology in the medical field, those kinds of things are still in the processing stages, and we’ll need to be watching those and seeing how they help out," Marshall said, adding that the technology can also help reduce errors.

"We need a fix," Marshall said. "I don’t know if repeal is the right word."

Marshall and Beitler both oppose the "don’t ask, don’t tell" policy that bans gays from being able to serve openly in the military, a policy a federal judge in California recently ruled unconstitutional.

"Anybody who wants to serve their country, and they’re willing to risk life and limb, they’re a hero as far as I’m concerned," Beitler said.

"We need the best talent we’ve got," Marshall said. "To exclude people who are talented and willing to dthe service for you and me and everybody else, that’s really very, very unfair and wrong."

Congress–not the courts–should decide the issue, Burr said.

"This is the wrong time, while we’ve got troops deployed in two theaters, to make a massive policy change," Burr said Saturday. "But I believe that there’ll be an appropriate point in the future to have a public debate on it and have a vote in Congress."

Immigration reform

All three candidates want immigration reform with clear ways to earn citizenship.

"You have to grant amnesty, and by amnesty I just mean a pardon–not citizenship," Beitler said. "Bring them out of the shadows and then have a pathway for citizenship."

Earning citizenship could involve paying more in taxes, serving in the military or looking at civic duties or services, Beitler said.

Marshall, who opposes amnesty, said mass deportations are neither practical nor fair to taxpayers and the nation must toughen up on laws regarding employers.

"It would be futile if we haven’t closed our borders because they will be making a migration back in," Marshall said. "We’ve got to enforce the laws that are already on the books."

She supports reforming the process for immigrants to become legal citizens, including paying fines and back taxes and learning English.

Burr also opposes amnesty.

"I do not believe it is fair to reward those who have broken our laws, particularly at the expense of those who have followed the rules and applied for citizenship through the legal process," Burr said in a prepared statement. "I believe we should first ensure that our borders are secure, and then we should work to ensure that we have a legal immigration process that is understandable, consistent and followed."