Small business owners voiced concerns over House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s plan to repeal the Trump administration’s 2017 tax cuts and double the national minimum wage to $15 an hour in a media call with Job Creators Network Thursday.
“The climate for small business owners have never been better,” said Job Creators Network CEO Alfredo Ortiz, citing data from a Gallup poll that reported 80 percent of U.S. business owners saying their company’s financial situation is good.
Since Donald Trump was elected, Ortiz said small business creation surged with new business applications increasing 16 percent. Overall, since the election, 5 million jobs have been created, resulting in a low unemployment rate, especially for minorities.
Susan Kochevar, owner of the 88 Drive-In Theater in Commerce City, Colorado, shared how her business was impacted by a state mandated minimum wage increase.
“I was looking forward to expanding and offering more low-cost entertainment and more jobs to young people, but my state, in 2017, passed a minimum wage amendment,” she stated. “The minimum wage goes up 90 cents for the next three years. This is a huge cost to small businesses.”
Kochevar added how she is paying her employees more than the new minimum wage.
“In Colorado, we’re going to $12 an hour, but it’s not just a $12 increase. Social Security and Medicare are a percentage of payroll, and employers match that so it’s really more than $12 an hour I’m paying,” she said. “We’ve already lost a few Colorado businesses due to the minimum wage increase.”
Joseph Semprevivo, the CEO and president of Joseph’s Lite Cookies in Sebastian, Florida, drew attention on the call to how the coffee shop that once employed Rep. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez, D-N.Y., shut down mostly due to New York’s minimum wage increase, which Ocasio-Cortez supported.
Read the full story from The Daily Signal
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