Political Quotes

“I wish to address my colleagues for a few minutes about the pending legislation that was recently introduced by my chairman and friend, Senator Baucus of Montana. This bill is targeted at creating jobs by providing targeted relief to our Nation's job engine, and that happens to be small businesses. Our Nation is currently facing challenging economic times, as we have now for about 20 months. While there have been some signs of improvement, such as the recent growth of our gross domestic product, job losses continue to mount and many hard-working Americans are struggling to make ends meet. According to our Bureau of Labor Statistics, around 8 million jobs have been lost since our economy officially slipped into recession in December of 2007. The unemployment rate is currently 9.7 percent, which is simply an unacceptable level. Small businesses in particular have been hit hard, with most job losses being attributed to businesses with fewer than 500 employees. According to the ADP national employment data, from December of 2007 through May of this year, small businesses with fewer than 500 employees saw employment decline by 6.4 million, while businesses with 500 or more employees saw employment decline by 1.66 million. According to this data, small businesses--those with fewer than 500 employees-- accounted, then, for nearly 80 percent of the decline in employment during that period of December 2007 through May 2010.”