I can’t believe we’re still having this argument about the causes of the lack of hiring and the jobs crisis, but once again, empirical evidence is seen to have a liberal bias. The Wall Street Journal asked economists to cite the cause of weak hiring, and in overwhelming numbers, they cited a lack of sales. [...]

I don’t think we’re making enough out of incompetence as a primary reason we’re mired in a zero-growth decade. For instance, the Federal Reserve, empowered with enormous control over the economy, simply didn’t perform well over the last three years in using unconventional monetary policy to give a boost to the economy. They left the [...]

It’s a bit of genius that the New York Times delivers their story about businesses pushing for a repatriation tax holiday under the series headline “But Nobody Pays That.” Because that four-word title refutes just about everything in the article from the business perspective. Businesses talk about the high nominal corporate tax rate. “But Nobody [...]

Last night, Republicans in the Senate blocked a cloture vote for James Cole to become the number 2 man in the Justice Department. Only one Republican, Richard Lugar, voted for cloture. All the others either voted know or stayed away from the chamber, which under the silly supermajority rules is as good as a no [...]

The Senate, as expected, passed HR 4 today, the first revision to the Affordable Care Act, repealing a revenue-raising provision that would have required small businesses to report vendor purchases above $600. They paid for the measure with the House pay-for, which penalizes recipients of exchange subsidies who change jobs or increase their income in [...]

The Obama Administration announced a Startup America initiative today at the White House, which mainly sounds like a verbal encouragement of startups and their job-creating opportunities more than anything. But there’s a little sweetener in there which shows that, still, the Administration sees tax cuts as the only step they can take on job creation. [...]

By a count of 237-187, the House gave final passage to a small business jobs bill which would cut some more taxes on small businesses (16 different small business tax breaks have now passed Congress in the past two years, eight in this bill), and provide a $30 billion dollar fund to community banks to [...]

The typical Republican dodge to make it look like they don’t simply support handing out $100,000 checks to millionaires is that increases on the high-end marginal tax brackets would hurt “small businesses” at a sensitive time for the nation’s economy. I can give you multiple reasons why this just isn’t true. First off, Democrats and [...]

The Senate today passed their small business jobs bill, passing cloture again on the final bill with the same 61 votes as before, all the Democrats plus George Voinovich and George LeMieux. The bill would create a $30 billion dollar small business lending fund for community banks to dole out, and would add a series [...]

It’s a small point, and I’ve said it before, but it needs amplifying. The passage of the small business jobs bill in Congress will help on the margins with businesses who have seen their credit lines shrink for various reasons. But ultimately, that’s not the central issue in the problems of small business hiring. And [...]

The Senate will invoke cloture on the small business bill today, with the support of Republican George Voinovich of Ohio and George LeMieux of Florida. Right now it looks like they’re waiting on some final votes as Senators get to the chamber, but this will pass. I’ll update with final numbers in a bit. UPDATE: [...]