Reich: The Revolt of Small Business Republicans

http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/30295-focus-the-revolt-of-small-business-republicans

For years, small-business groups such as the National Federation of Independent Businesses have lined up behind big businesses lobbies.

They’ve contributed to the same Republican candidates and committees favored by big business.

And they’ve eagerly connected the Republican Party in Washington to its local business base. Retailers, building contractors, franchisees, wholesalers, and restaurant owners are the bedrock of local Republican politics.

But now small businesses are breaking ranks. They’re telling congressional Republicans not to make the deal at the very top of big businesses’ wish list – a cut in corporate tax rates.

“Given the option, this or nothing, nothing is better for our members,” the director of legislative affairs at Associated Building Contractors told Bloomberg News. (Associated Building Contractors gave $1.6 million to Republicans in the 2014 midterm elections and nothing to Democrats.)

Small businesses won’t benefit from such a tax deal because most are S corporations and partnerships, known as “pass-throughs” since business income flows through to them and appears on their owners’ individual tax returns.

So a corporate tax cut without a corresponding cut in individual tax rates would put small businesses at a competitive disadvantage.