White House Briefing Agenda
This weekend concludes National Small Business Week, a tradition that began with President John F. Kennedy in 1963. I had the pleasure of spending part of the week in Washington DC, participating in events organized by the National Small Business Association, which recognized me as one of five finalists for the honor of small business advocate of the year. The White House organized a policy briefing for us; I have attached the agenda in the image graphic. For me the highlight of the briefing was the presentation by Gene Sperling, Counselor to the Secretary of the Treasury. He highlighted the four components of the Administration’s small business legislation package that he expects Congress to pass by the Fourth of July. He shared two concerns about the state of small businesses that particularly resonated with me. First, the National Federation of Independent Business publishes an index of small business optimism, reflecting the expectations and views business owners have about the state of the economy. We also have a “CEO Outlook” index, the Fortune-500 equivalent, that captures the big business view of the economy. These two indices should be the same, reflecting the same economy, but in fact there is a wide divergence in views and expectations. Small business and big business are having completely unrelated experiences in our current market which conditions their hopes for the future. The second, and related point, concerns the contraction in bank credit. Large corporations finance only 30% of their capital needs through banks; the comparable figure for small businesses is 90%. So when banks contract their lending, small businesses are more severely impacted. In future blog postings, I will write in greater detail about the issues discussed at this policy briefing and invite your comments. I will tell you that it was 99 degrees outside when we were in Washington DC and despite the stifling heat and humidity, I am very glad that I participated. We had a number of events for several hundred small business owners across the country to come together and work on policy issues of common concern. As difficult as the economy is right now, it is truly inspiring to be engaged in the small business community.