Business for Shared Prosperity

By Camille Moran
Syndicated by American Forum/Louisiana Forum, May 18, 2010

Wall Street's collapsing house of cards brought us a time of economic turmoil that most of us have not seen in our lifetimes. Patching the house of cards back together, though, will not bring us lasting recovery.

Op-Ed By Frank Knapp Jr.
The Hill, May 17, 2010

Members of Congress need look no further for the cause of voter unrest. The answer is in the Congressional Oversight Panel report released last week.

For many months now, small business owners have been trying to tell anyone who would listen that they are suffering from being largely shut out of the credit market. The Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) might have stabilized the nation’s too big to fail banks and our financial system, but small businesses know loans and credit lines from these giants are still scarce.

By Lew Prince
Op-Ed Syndicated by American Forum, May 14, 2010

I’ve owned a small business in St. Louis for 31 years. Like most of my customers and my 26 employees, I watched as greedy hedge funds, irresponsible investment banks and unscrupulous mortgage companies decimated our savings, investments and pension funds, and nearly drove our country into another Great Depression. Now those same hedge funds, investment banks and mortgage companies are spending more than $1.4 million dollars a day (that’s right -- a day) to scuttle financial reform legislation in the U.S. Senate.

By Brian O'Connell
MainStreet/The Street Network, May 12, 2010

Are small businesses lining up behind the financial reform bill being bandied about in Congress right now?

Not specifically. Small business groups have been hectoring banks for two years now to open its credit lines and start lending to small businesses again. But that hasn’t been happening, and the reform bill doesn’t fix that.

By Monika Mitchell
Good Business International, May 12, 2010

Remember the Old Boys’ Club…? The boring, cranky, devious one that controls the banks, the economy and most of our wealth creation and money supply from behind the scenes? The one where nearly every key position in government is occupied by an Old Boy? Yes, that one.

Well, there are still a few lifetime members of the OBC firmly entrenched in the Federal Reserve (Grandpa Ben), and the Treasury (Timmy G and Larrykins) who continue to give all our money away to their ever-popular clubby friends.

By Tim Fernholz
American Prospect, May 11, 2010

There's a bit of a lost message in the financial-reform debate right now: American businesses will benefit from the Wall Street overhaul currently before Congress. Time's Barbara Kiviat looks at why the Consumer Financial Protection Agency will help firms:

By Barbara Kiviat
Time, May 10, 2010

As the Senate continues debating financial-industry reform this week, I'd like to re-iterate a point I first made in a Time.com article: lots of businessmen are in favor of a sweeping overhaul.

You wouldn't necessarily know that from reading the headlines, since headlines tend to capture the highest profile lobbying—like what comes from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. Those stories usually say that companies are wary of financial-industry reform, typically because of the fear that the cost of doing business will rise.

By Edward Wyatt and Sewell Chan
New York Times, May 1, 2010

WASHINGTON — An unlikely new tenant in the halls of the Federal Reserve would set out sweeping rules on a wide swath of consumer transactions, possibly making it one of the most powerful new federal agencies in a generation.

The proposed agency is causing concern and confusion, however, among owners of small businesses — drug stores, jewelers, pawnbrokers and car dealers — who fear that by allowing any customers to buy on credit, their businesses could be subject to significant new regulations.

By Margot Dorfman
The Hill, 4/29/10

Wall Street firms have become disconnected from our Main Street communities and from the good old-fashioned American values and work ethic that made America the greatest economic force in the world.

America’s small businesses have been crippled by an unbridled financial system led by Wall Street gamblers who don’t care who they hurt or how they contort our economy just as long as their bonuses and bailouts keep their own pockets fat with cash.

YES: Greater transparency will help prevent future economic meltdowns.

By David Hills and Michael Lent

Atlanta Journal Constitution, April 28, 2010

Millions of America’s small business owners suffer from bad practices on Wall Street — something often given short shrift in debate about creation of a consumer financial protection agency.