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The Backbone of America

Friday, June 14, 2002

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From the NFIB National Summit
Washington, DC
• The people attending the National Federation of Independent Business summit here are at the opposite end of the scale - the opposite end of the economic universe - from the senior executives at places like Enron, and Tyco.

• They do not have a private jet, a limousine with a driver, or a personal aide who goes along to open doors and press elevator buttons. They drive themselves in what is often the oldest car in the lot. Their personal aide is their kid who comes in on Saturdays to help out.

• They do not have whole departments of lawyers helping to decipher the latest enhancements in the tax code. They have lunch with their lawyer, and their banker at the same table, in the same restaurant every day; and have for years.

• They do not have a human resources department to oversee thousands of employees who are only known to them, collectively, as "headcount." In fact they don't have human resources at all. They have employees.

• They don't consider layoffs as the first line of defense against a downturn. When times get rough, they often take a little less themselves so few more people can stay on the payroll for a little longer.

• And they don't keep the strictest accounts of sick days, and holidays. They often forget to dock the pay of the single mom who misses a day here and there because her child needs some extra love and care, even though it means taking up the slack themselves.

• They do not borrow tens of millions of dollars from their business so they can personally buy other businesses. They lend money TO their business to tide it over when a large customer is - once again - a slow pay.

• And these are the same people who take their time sending a bill to a good customer going through a temporary rough patch.

• They do not worry about "making their quarterly numbers." They worry about meeting the weekly payroll. They don't have conference calls with market analysts, they have coffee with their customers.

• These are the people who run the small to mid-sized businesses, who hire the entry-level employees, who pay the property taxes, and who breathe life into downtowns by refusing to move to the strip mall out near the interstate because they think downtowns are important.

• These are the people who go to work - not just every day - but many nights, most weekends, and too many holidays.

• These are the people who pay for the Little League uniforms and buy the ads in the programs for the school plays, well after their kids have graduated and gone off on their own.

• These are the people who take their turn at the Lion's Club hot dog stand at the Fourth of July parade, and put the signs in their windows supporting the Jaycee annual picnic and the church bake sale, even if it's not the church they attend.

• They create the enterprise which generates the first dollar. The dollar gets multiplied up the economic food chain until it reaches the Microsofts and the Fords, but it starts with these folks.

• They are America's small business women and men. They are the backbone of America.
  --END --
  Copyright © 2002 Richard A. Galen

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