Since 2008 family businesses have borne the brunt of much of the financial difficulties, tax and regulatory burden that has emerged from our country’s experiment with socialism. From TARP to Qualitative Easing to Dodd-Frank to Fed Policy to the Affordable Care Act and a host of other laws and policies, we have taken it on the chin. The so called economic recovery has helped Wall Street and Washington DC but not the family owned business. Family businesses neither have had access to such cheap capital as was available to Wall Street and the Big Banks nor any help in mitigating the onslaught of regulations costs and taxes that are hounding us every day.
Against the backdrop of all this negativity, I believe it is important to remember things that we all know about the family owned business. We are the jobs creator and the economic backbone of America. While Apple, Facebook and Wal Mart may get the headlines, it is the family owned car dealership, construction company, manufacturer, restaurant, farm or ranch that provides much of the goods and services that make up our economy. It is the distributor or the trucking company that gets goods to where they are needed or can be sold. In thousands of different ways we impact millions of people’s lives either by providing them with those goods and services that are necessary for their very sustenance or employing them in the process of delivering such goods and services. We understand at a gut level what free market capitalism is all about and we should not be embarrassed to be strident advocates of our case to everyone we have contact with….including the journalists and media outlets.
We should have pride in what we have built (yes we did build it, not Elizabeth Warren or Barrack Obama) and in spite of the assault on our way of life, we should hold our heads high and recognize that a well- run and properly managed family business that prospers generation to generation is still the greatest wealth and jobs creator there is. We should advocate for ourselves stridently and confidently to whoever we can.
