The shocking costs of running a small business

Austan Goolsbee Obama chief economic adviser leaving, Citizen Wells commenters on small business problems, Obama economic failures

From commenter Jonah:

Our family has owned a business for almost 40 years. I started paying the bills for the business about 7 years ago and I was alarmed to learn the cost to run a business.

OUR SMALL BUSINESSES PAYS:

FEDERAL INCOME TAX
STATE INCOME TAX
FEDERAL UNEMPLOYMENT TAX
STATE UNEMPLOYMENT TAX
7% SOCIAL SECURITY TAX FOR EMPLOYEES
(this is in addition to the 7% the employee gives the government)
PROPERTY TAX
PERSONAL PROPERTY TAX
UTILITY TAXES ON GAS, ELECTRIC, AND PHONE
GASOLINE TAX
SALES TAX TO THE STATE FOR EVERYTHING WE SELL
APROXIMATELY 7% SALES TAX ON EVERYTHING WE BUY

PLUS WE PAY:

MEDICAL INSURANCE
AUTO INSURANCE
PROPERTY INSURANCE
LIABILITY INSURANCE
WORKMAN’S COMP
VARIOUS LICENSES AND PERMITS

...I’m sure I’ve forgotten a few things.

THE GOVERNMENT GETS MORE OF OUR MONEY THAN WE DO!

Two new EPA pollution regulations will slam the coal industry so hard that hundreds of thousands of jobs will be lost, electric rates will skyrocket 11% to over 23%

GatewayPundit: Obama’s EPA Regulations Will Cost Coal Industry $200 Billion & Cause Electricity Rates to Skyrocket

FCC chairman agrees to strike Fairness Doctrine from rulebooks

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski said his agency will remove the Fairness Doctrine from the rulebooks in response to a recent request from House Republicans.

"I fully support deleting the Fairness Doctrine and related provisions from the Code of Federal Regulations, so that there can be no mistake that what has been a dead letter is truly dead," Genachowski wrote in a letter Monday to House Energy and Commerce Chairman Fred Upton (R-Mich.).

Read more

The buildings commonly referred to as "green" could actually be hazardous to your health, according to a new report.

Green Buildings Hazardous to Health? Report Cites Risks of Weatherization

How has the Obama administration contributed to this failure to achieve a robust and sustainable recovery?

Wall Street Journal:

1. The administration's most obvious failure was its misguided fiscal policies: the cash-for-clunkers subsidy for car buyers, the tax credit for first-time home buyers, and the $830 billion "stimulus" package...
   
   
2. A second cause of the continued economic weakness is the president's emphasis on increasing tax rates...
   
   
3. A third problem stems from the administration's lack of an explicit plan to deal with future budget deficits and with the exploding national debt. This creates uncertainty about future tax increases and interest rates that impedes spending by households and investment by businesses...
   
   
4. Finally, there is the administration's incoherent position on the international value of the dollar...

Read more at the The Economy Is Worse Than You Think

BREAKING: NEW MEXICO RANCHER MURDERED BY ILLEGAL ALIEN

Hidalgo County Sheriff Department has confirmed that New Mexico rancher, Larry Link, was murdered earlier today on his property.

Sources are reporting that the rancher was responding to an alleged- illegal alien on his property at Stein’s Ghost Town when the he was gunned-down. The murder took place on the southwest side of the state near the Arizona border on Interstate 10 at mile marker three.

The Hidalgo Sheriff’s Deputies responded to the scene, only to find the rancher had already died.

Stay tuned for updates as the happen. A Sheriff Department spokesperson said the investigation has been turned over to the New Mexico State Police, who are not releasing any further details.

San Diego Examiner

2003-2008: HOW OBAMA WAS GROOMED TO BE OUR FIRST MARXIST PRESIDENT

Excerpts:

Natural Born Citizen:

Bingham’s work lay dormant for twenty-six years when it was resurrected again in 2003 as Democrat members of Congress made no less than eight (8) attempts in twenty-two (22) months, to either eliminate the natural-born requirement, or redefine natural-born to accommodate Barack Hussein Obama II in advance of his rise to power. The evidence is right in the congressional record…

The election:

...the DNC was forced to remove the “constitutionally eligible” language from the 2008 DNC certification of the Obama-Biden ticket, omitting from the certification the following language:

“and that the following candidates for President and Vice President of the United States are legally qualified to serve under the provisions of the United States Constitution.”

Instead, the DNC only certified that the Obama-Biden ticket was duly nominated for the offices of President and Vice President, using the following language:

“THIS IS TO CERTIFY that at the National Convention of the Democrat Party of the United States of America, held in Denver, Colorado on August 25 though 28, 2008, the following were duly nominated as candidates of said Party for President and Vice President of the United States respectively:” (Note that the word “through” is misspelled in both DNC versions, indicating that it is an alteration from the same document.)

"...these wheels were set in motion in the late ‘90s and placed in overdrive in 2003..."

Evidence Broadens Obama Natural Born Conspiracy

U.N. Agreement Should Have All Gun Owners Up In Arms

Via InstaPundit.com:

FORBES: U.N. Agreement Should Have All Gun Owners Up In Arms. This must be more of that under-the-radar stuff Obama was talking about. “Former U.N. ambassador John Bolton has cautioned gun owners to take this initiative seriously, stating that the U.N. ‘is trying to act as though this is really just a treaty about international arms trade between nation states, but there is no doubt that the real agenda here is domestic firearms control.’”

Government Spending Affects Gross Domestic Product

We have tried spending a lot of money to jumpstart the economy, and it has failed. Now we need to cut spending and lift the uncertainty paralyzing economic activity. That approach will not just be more fiscally responsible. It will also empower individuals and entrepreneurs, and they are the only ones who can bring on a real recovery...

National Center for Policy Analysis

Life

On the first day, God created the dog and said, "Sit all day by the door of your house and bark at anyone who comes in or walks past. For this, I will give you a life span of twenty years."

The dog said, "That's a long time to be barking. How about only ten years and I'll give you back the other ten?"

So God saw that it was good.

On the second day, God created the monkey and said, "Entertain people, do tricks, and make them laugh. For this, I'll give you a twenty-year life span."

The monkey said, "Monkey tricks for twenty years? That's a pretty long time to perform. How about I give you back ten like the dog did?"

And God, again, saw that it was good.

On the third day, God created the cow and said, "You must go into the field with the farmer all day long and suffer under the sun, have calves and give milk to support the farmer's family. For this, I will give you a life span of sixty years."

The cow said, "That's kind of a tough life you want me to live for sixty years. How about twenty and I'll give back the other forty?"

And God agreed that it was good.

On the fourth day, God created humans and said, "Eat, sleep, play, marry and enjoy your life. For this, I'll give you twenty years."

But the human said, "Only twenty years? Could you possibly give me my twenty, the forty the cow gave back, the ten the monkey gave back, and the ten the dog gave back; that makes eighty, okay?"

"Okay," said God, "You asked for it."

So that is why for our first twenty years, we eat, sleep, play and enjoy ourselves. For the next forty years, we slave in the sun to support our family. For the next ten years, we do monkey tricks to entertain the grandchildren. And for the last ten years, we sit on the front porch and bark at everyone.

Life has now been explained to you.

(There is no need to thank me for this valuable information. I'm doing it as a public service. If you are looking for me I will be on the front porch.)

SHOCK: Los Angeles Times published an honest story about Sarah Palin (and Paul Revere)!

You may have heard recently something about that Sarah Palin telling a reporter that Paul Revere warned the British on his famous rousing revolutionary ride.

Now, that so many Americans have wallowed in their smug confirmation that Palin is an idiot unqualified for anything but repeating sixth-grade history, how far, wide and fast do you think the contradictory news will spread that the former governor of Alaska was indeed correct?

You know how Sarah Palin said Paul Revere warned the British? Well, he did. Now, who looks stupid?

HAT TIP: HillBuzz

Obamacare survey: At least three of every 10 employers will probably stop offering health coverage

Wall Street Journal/Market Watch: Once provisions of the Affordable Care Act start to kick in during 2014, 30% of companies say they’ll stop offering coverage

Good job, Bama!

The scariest jobs chart you’ll ever see...

...and every month it gets updated it just looks worse.

From PowerLine: UPDATE: A reader comments

Klavan's One-State Solution: Give the Middle East to the Jews

The "aren't I nice, please don't kill me" new exhibition at Los Angeles County Museum Of Art

Libs, read more: here.

www.lacma.org

Children, the elderly, pregnant women, and persons with weakened immune systems should avoid eating raw sprouts of any kind...

Since Germany says beansprouts may be behind E.coli, and since there's also Four suspected U.S. cases of E.coli linked to Germany, we should all bone up on Sprouts: What You Should Know from FoodSafety.gov...or, better yet, just call the White House and check out the bombshell dropped by Michelle Obama yesterday ("it seems that having multiple words, numbers, and perplexing punctuation such as commas was too much for us to understand...")

Donald Trump vs. Chicago/White House Mob

BRILLIANT ANALYSIS!

http://barnhardt.biz/

POSTED BY ANN BARNHARDT - JUNE 2, AD 2011 9:39 AM MST
Goodness, I am getting slow at the switch in my old age. I don't know why this didn't occur to me sooner. I know exactly what Donald Trump is doing and why with all of his threatening to run for POTUS and his sudden interest in Obama's lack of eligibility and personal documentation.

The Illinois legislature and City of Chicago (Rahm Emanuel, Mayor™) just approved a massive expansion and approval of casino gaming in Chicago itself and throughout the state. Trump has seen this coming for years and has made massive investments in Chicago real estate, most notably the Trump International Hotel and Tower at 401 N Wabash. If you have been to Chicago anytime within the last several years, you have seen it. It is very big, and I'll admit, an aesthetically pleasing building.

Trump is no fool. Atlantic City, New Jersey is as good as dead, and Trump knows that dumping money into trying to revitalize Atlantic City as a gaming destination would be throwing good money after bad. The awful TV show "Jersey Shore" has now done longterm economic damage to that entire area - and that is no joke. So, years ago he figured out what the next hot gaming center would be: Chicago.

Think about it. Chicago is within driving distance of a massive chunk of the central U.S. and Canada. It has a fully-established infrastructure and employee pool. It has one of the largest, most liquid hub airports on the continent with a decent secondary airport. It's Vegas, except everything is already there, and the major ethnic groups are Slavs and Poles instead of Italians and Jews in Vegas. :-)

Trump has two motivations here. First the MINOR motivation. In establishing a new gaming empire in the central U.S., he is tapping into a largely conservative mid-western consumer base. What he is doing is essentially re-branding himself and the Trump name as a conservative or conservative-friendly brand. All of the little old men and women in Nebraska and Iowa and Missouri and Kentucky and rural Michigan will now specifically and consciously CHOOSE to patronize a Trump-brand casino in Chicago because Trump is a "Republican who stood up to Obama and demanded his birth certificate!" A year ago most of those same people probably looked down on Trump as a slippery New York City real estate trader with bad hair who is now on his third model/wife. Now he is as conservative and American as apple pie. Say what you will of Trump, but this re-branding maneuver that he has pulled off is admittedly brilliant. But it is only a mere maneuver. The sincerity of it is . . . lacking.

Which brings us to Trump's MAJOR motivation in pushing the birth certificate and other vital records issue. Trump's plan is to dominate and control the Chicago gaming concession. He is in on the ground floor, knows that his position is very, very strong, and wants to keep it that way. What he also knows is that in order for him to be successful in Chicago, he MUST assert dominance over the massively powerful and utterly corrupt Chicago City Hall.

Trump is no pushover and refuses to bow to the Chicago City Hall / Union Mob machine. And why should he? Trump has the Chicago Machine by the throat because the Chicago Machine made a terrible, terrible mistake several years ago. What was that mistake? They tied their entire fortunes to the single most blackmail-able human being in the history of the world: Barack Obama.

In their blind quest for power, the Chicago Marxist/Mob syndicate put all their chips on a smooth-talking light-skinned black guy who could talk the centrist talk, but was actually a hardcore Marxist plant. And it worked - for a time. They got the White House. But here's the problem. Their smooth-talking, light-skinned black guy wasn't born in the United States, was born the son of a British Subject, was adopted by an Indonesian and is thus also an Indonesian citizen, was raised by card-carrying Communists, attended college as a foreign student and traveled internationally under a non-U.S. passport as an adult, has used hard drugs including crack for all of his adult life, has been an active homosexual for his entire adult life, has more aliases and social security numbers than Jason Bourne (or is that Harrison J. Bounel?) and is actually dumber than a bag of hair.

Trump has enough blackmail material on Obama to keep himself in a position of firm dominance over the Chicago Marxist Syndicate. Every time the Chicago Mob gives Trump static, he can just go on TV and simply ASK about some blackmail-able facet of Obama's past. When the Chicago Mob backs off of Trump, Trump backs off of them. Do you think maybe that is what we are seeing right now?

In fact, if Trump plays his cards right (no pun intended), he could TAKE DOWN the Chicago Marxist Syndicate, and refill the power vacuum with his own people. It would be swapping one degree of corruption for another, but at this point, I wouldn't mind seeing what a Trump-run Chicago might look like. Trump is a businessman and understands that the gridlock of corruption and out-of-control crime on the street is very, very bad for business. Chicago is a cool town with great attractions and museums and wonderful ethnic neighborhoods (and food!). The good people who live and work there deserve better, and Chicago should be a city that all Americans can be proud of.

I am definitely conflicted. I hate casinos, as I wrote about last week, and I'm no fan of Trump, but can see what he is doing and why. This Chicago Marxist Syndicate needs to be taken down hard because it is destroying this nation and the world through the Obama regime. This isn't just about bribing South-Side Aldermen and sweetheart real estate deals in Hyde Park anymore. This Chicago Marxist thug crap is going to collapse the global economy and start World War 3. Millions of people are going to die because of these people. Thus, I am content to watch Trump make his move. The Lord works and moves in mysterious ways. Sometimes VERY mysterious.

MOTHER JONES: Relative to population growth, we've been generating no new jobs at all.

So yes: "Any sane person should look at these numbers and conclude that the economy desperately needs a boost." Even the not especially sane ought to have figured that out by now.

Employment Picture Even Grimmer Than You Think

Why Hasn't Anyone Signed Up For the High-Risk Health Insurance Pools?

Since we don't seem to be able to find many of those people, HHS is using the money to cover anyone who lacks insurance and can get a doctor to attest that they've been sick in the last year. They will eventually no doubt claim that the high-risk pools were a success, relaxing the conditions until they can say they've covered 200,000 or so people. But the mystery will not have gone away. Where are the unsinsurables? And why didn't they want to buy insurance?

Read the whole thing

How is this hot dog like the U.S. economy?

Obama turned them both into shit.

President Obama wolfs down TWO chili dogs and fries... the day after his wife unveils new dietary guide.