Why Would Anyone Want To Open A Business?

Why would anyone in this country, want to open a business of their own? It seems that if you do, you automatically have a partner and not a silent partner, a partner that puts up no money, takes none of the risks or responsibilities, but comes in and tells you how you should run your business. I am sure that everyone has guessed that the name of this partner is Government. You see, you work hard, save your money, take the risk of starting a new business, then the Government steps in and tells you how to run it, and they could not care less when you have to fold because of all the regulation they slap down on you.

I know this first hand, having lost my mortgage business, not because of the housing meltdown, I was squeaking by after that. However, when the Government came in with all its new regulation, that was the final nail in the coffin. Big mortgage companies could afford to have separate compliance departments that employ 10 to 12 people, I had a small business, just me and three others, how could I afford that? I know eight other brokers that went out of business as well because of new Government regulation.

You would think that right in the middle of our great recession, Government would make it easier for a business to flourish, but leave it to Obama to make it harder for a business, not easier. However, what can you expect from a President who has no clue about what makes an economy run and grow.  We have a President who has put more people out of work than he put back to work.

95% of what Government does in the private sector should be eliminated, the only time Government should mandate what a business does is when it comes to public safety. Things like how many fire exits a business should have or what kind of lighting on the stairwells, or the type of sprinklers, these are the things a Government should mandate, everything else, butt out.

I am a big free market guy, I believe the market should dictate its own needs. I don’t believe there should be a minimum wage law, let the market dictate, why should I pay someone ten dollars an hour when they are only worth five? A minimum wage not only hurts new businesses, but contributes to unemployment as well. If I have a new business and I could really use two people, but I can only afford to pay ten dollars an hour, it makes it harder on me and there is one person left unemployed.

Affirmative action, all those discrimination laws and quota systems have to go; all they do is create a mountain of lawsuits and keeps the most qualified people from getting the job. If a person takes the risk and opens up a business, he should be able to hire fire and promote who ever he wants and for whatever reason he wants.

Why can’t we take a lesson from Singapore, which has one of the best economies in the world. The overall regulatory environment remains one of the world’s most transparent and efficient. With no minimum capital required, launching a business takes only three days. The top income tax rate is 20 percent, and the top corporate tax rate is 17 percent. There is no minimum wage, yet Singapore has the world’s highest percentage of millionaires, with one out of every six households having at least one million US dollars in disposable wealth.

The Singaporean economy is known as one of the freest, most innovative, most competitive, and most business-friendly. The Index of Economic Freedom ranks Singapore as the second freest economy in the world, behind Hong Kong. According to the Corruption Perceptions Index, Singapore is consistently ranked as one of the least corrupt countries in the world. Acute poverty is rare in Singapore; the government has rejected the idea of a generous welfare system, stating that each generation must earn and save enough for its entire life cycle.

Wow, isn’t that what America should be like, what the hell are we doing wrong? No wonder why Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin packed-up and moved there.

My latest book: “What Kind Of Society Are We Leaving Our Kids.”  Available Here

This is one man’s opinion.