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As a small business owner I can tell you we are putting of hiring for pretty much the same reasons mentioned in WSJ. Basically you are paying double to hire an employee.
You are paying for employees what they cost, that is, what the market determines. What are you doubling? (The taxes and whatnot are simply part of the total cost).
Editorialized submission headline for a highly editorialized piece. Regardless of the issues at hand, no thanks.
The original WSJ article struck me as disingenuous, but this article seems to just go the ad hominem route.
As a small business owner I can tell you we are putting of hiring for pretty much the same reasons mentioned in WSJ. Basically you are paying double to hire an employee.
As for the point about small business not hiring due to extra costs. I'm sure it's true but this isn't something that was put in place in the last 2 years. This was true in all the recessions and booms we've had sine world war 2 and FDR if not before.
The original WSJ article struck me as disingenuous, but this article seems to just go the ad hominem route.
Similarly, knowing someone's background is pretty crucial for an op-ed. If the piece is being sold as "I'm a typical businessman, and Obama's policies are keeping me from hiring people", then it's important to know if the businessman in question is typical, or if he's politically connected.
Edit: Typo'd "solid" for "sold".
As a small business owner I can tell you we are putting of hiring for pretty much the same reasons mentioned in WSJ. Basically you are paying double to hire an employee.
I don't understand that logic. Yes, if I buy an Apple for 1$, it costs double than if an Apple would just cost 0.50$. You are paying for employees what they cost, that is, what the market determines. What are you doubling? (The taxes and whatnot are simply part of the total cost).
I'm not saying his logic is correct but it's not hard to understand
Editorialized submission headline for a highly editorialized piece. Regardless of the issues at hand, no thanks.
Definitely the worst article to ever hit the #1 spot on HN. It looks like yesterday's WSJ editorial must have hit a raw nerve with a lot of HNers, and this makes them feel better. I'm okay with quality HN articles about politics. It's just a shame that the top spot on HN is being reduced to this sort of cheap partisan bickering. I hope HN does not become yet another MotherJones/MSNBC or WSJ/FoxNews.
As a small business owner I can tell you we are putting of hiring for pretty much the same reasons mentioned in WSJ. Basically you are paying double to hire an employee.
But what's the argument? That there are taxes or overhead? The truth is that you're not hiring for charity in the first place. So if the true cost (burdened cost) of a new employee doesn't make you more than enough money to cover that, don't hire. Just because the cost of an employee is not the "sticker" price, and is somehow more complicated, doesn't mean that you're being punished to hire people.
1) On the first day/week/month, the employee is probably not going to contribute much, and in general you are taking a risk. The lower the sticker price on that risk, the more people are likely to take it.
2) If your business is making 250K and spending 240K on employing 4 employees @ 60K each and you want to stay net positive, you need to wait until you reach 300K before you hire the next person[1]. So there are these gaps in ramping up a business which can only be overcome with growth. When salaries are lower, these gaps are smaller. Looking at the broader labor market and assuming growth, lower taxes would mean smaller gaps and potentially less unemployment.
[1] Note that because of their opportunity costs, its harder to hire professionals for part-time.
The government takes way to much for each employee hired. 33%! The author would realize this is a HUGE problem for employers, but I forget he is only a political blogger.
Thus when you hire 3 and a tax rate of 33% + 33% + 33%, you are really paying for 4 people and getting 3. That makes it hard to hire more employees.
Then comes the health care, which drives this 33% even higher. As the wsj author states
"Every year, we negotiate a renewal to our health coverage. This year, our provider demanded a 28% increase in premiums—for a lesser plan. This is in part a tax increase that the federal government has co-opted insurance providers to collect. We had never faced an increase anywhere near this large; in each of the last two years, the increase was under 10%."
28% is a HUGE increase..
Don't turn this into a political "I must defend/attack obama/bush" article. He stated everything with facts to defend why. 33% per employee and rising quickly in just a years time is a huge reason not to hire someone new.