Institute for Justice: The Power of One Entrepreneur Campaign
by Bob EwingIf government is serious about job creation, it should get out of the way of the entrepreneurs who actually create them.
That is the message of a new campaign launched this week by the Institute for Justice—the nation’s leading legal advocate for economic liberty. A series of studies called The Power of One Entrepreneur highlight the tremendous impact that a single entrepreneur can have on their family, employees, community, other entrepreneurs and beyond.
Consider Melony Armstrong of Tupelo, Mississippi.
Melony is an African hairbraider and a mother of four. She is the owner of Naturally Speaking, a hairbraiding salon that serves her community and has employed dozens of women. In addition, Melony has taught more than 125 individuals how to braid.
But before she could even open her doors, she had to battle through mountains of red tape. The state forced her to spend 300 hours in cosmetology classes. And to teach others how to braid, she had to obtain a special license that required over 3,000 hours of additional classes. Here’s the kicker: In all of this government-mandating training, she received no actual instruction in hairbraiding.
In August 2004, Melony teamed up with the Institute for Justice to challenge these needless barriers that had the effect of keeping grassroots entrepreneurs just like her from being able to open their own businesses. Less than a year later, her case resulted in a new law that lifted the restrictions, paving the way for hairbraiding entrepreneurship throughout the state.
Chervy Lesure is a hairbraider who learned her skill from Melony. She said that Melony has “given an opportunity to people who had the talent to braid but couldn’t and were on public assistance.” Deborah Nutall, who owns a hairbraiding salon in neighboring Tennessee, understands well the importance of Melony’s impact on the region:
“She put up a fight, and that gives others courage to believe in themselves. By standing her ground, she created an opportunity for others to lead a successful life—they don’t have to wait for a handout.”
Jackie Spates learned to braid from Melony and went on to open her own business:
“I took Melony’s braiding classes because I wanted to learn the professional way. The experience showed me how to do it and gave me the confidence I need to run my own salon.”
In all, Melony Armstrong has created over 300 hairbraiding jobs. She exemplifies the power of one entrepreneur, when simply cut free from needless red tape. In a nutshell, people like Melony are the key to helping countless Americans improve their economic fortunes, and, more broadly, the key to our nation’s economic recovery.
Of course, Melony is not the only entrepreneur fighting big government to secure her American Dream. The other four reports released this week detail the following cases:
- Seattle-area bagel man Dennis Ballen donates nearly as many bagels as he sells, supporting nonprofit organizations across his region. But Ballen’s thriving enterprise was almost driven out of business by busy-body bureaucrats: www.ij.org/Ballen
- Kim Powers took on the powerful funeral home and cemetery cartel in Oklahoma. She went to dramatic lengths and fought a good fight, ultimately losing in court. But that didn’t stop her. Now she is back and more successful than ever: www.ij.org/Bridges.
- Thane Hayhurst from Dallas helps businesses across the state keep their computers running at peak efficiency. He also places workers from across the nation in hard-to-fill jobs and volunteers for local community centers. Naturally, government officials are trying to shut him down: www.ij.org/Hayhurst.
- Hector Ricketts’ “dollar vans” have battled the politically powerful and heavily subsidized New York City public buses for years. He serves the low-income areas that are routinely neglected by public transportation. Despite overwhelming odds against him, Hector continues to grow his small business that takes—as well as puts—numerous people to work: www.ij.org/Ricketts.
For more on the Power of One Entrepreneur, check out http://ij.org/power.
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66 Comments
It's more than just the federal government that beats up on the American entrepreneur, local government and state government (especially here in CA), forces someone to raise so much capital to pay all the fees and taxes. Mix that in with all the regulation and red tape to open it up in a reasonable time, you just force way too many to just skip out on their idea. Down the drain goes more jobs.
To Obama, if the job does not involve the Government, than it's not a real job.
Without private sector jobs and investment, you get an Obama/Keynesian "Dead-End" economy…
Slow growth, no growth, stagflation…an alot of pissed off contractors..
The role of government should be funding and equipping the military, protect the borders, maintain the roads, and air traffic control. After that, go away!
I truly can't type the words that come to mind when reading this stuff. This is the result, and continuing efforts, of the "I know what's best" attitude of the Libs and Progressives. And this is just small business – just think about the 100,000% magnified boondogle that drives BIG business overseas.
How ya'll Lib's likin' that Hopey-Changey Bovine Manure now?
Still service economy jobs for the most part. Still won't add to the wealth of this country significantly or at all. Braiding hair and driving cabs? Come on.
She is the owner of Naturally Speaking, a hairbraiding salon that serves her community and has employed dozens of women.
Why is it that this verbiage is only used for non-Whites? Do Whites have a community? Can they?
"If government is serious about job creation,"
Nope
Big Business LOVES regulation – they lobby for it. It prevents small businesses from competing with them. And small businesses hire Americans and the globalists running big business can't tolerate that!
In December of 96 I sat in the den of my house and did a business plan for a start-up business. Thirteen and a half years and almost 50 employees later I guess it could qualify for success. However, with Obamacare, there will be no job expansion because of the clause which states that once a small business gets to 51 employees then it no longer qualifies as small, therefore, any firm which employs over 50 people will be required to provide mandatory insurance or be fined $2000 per employee. Can you spell J-O-B-K-I-L-L-E-R. As a private business, we don't have the ability to forcibly take money from productive people at the point of a gun, it would be considered theft and result in a lengthy jail sentence.
Them's that can't do, teach. Them's that can't do OR teach, govern. No offense intended for teachers. Can't say the same for politicians.
Our fellow commie is here finally!!
Hint: Big Businesses lobby so that the Legislation that is ALREADY going to be pushed can possibly be adjusted in their favor. It's called Protecting your PROFIT. EVERYONE does it – OMG – even a U.S. Senator from Mass. who got CAUGHT trying to protect his money and not have to give it to the State.
Hint 2: ALL small businesses serve THEIR community – THAT'S WHY THEY ARE SMALL!!! (seriously, if they served more, they'd be BIG!!!)
It's going to be a FUN day today with the Libs, I can already tell!!
They don’t really want anyone to succeed in business or otherwise. They only want success if the government can take some credit and the profit. It is the progressive way to determine who, what, where, and when someone gets the necessary break to create a business. I bet Bill Gates would have embraced that philosophy with vigor when he was starting Microsoft NOT. Henry Ford might have waited, Carnegie may have decided that he wouldn’t have been able to get the backing here in the United States and whoops no industrial revolution. But I believe that is what the loons of the left want. They want us in the dark ages again so they can rebuild in their image. Pretty darn ugly image if you ask me.
Dude, lay off the stupid racism for once in your life.
Besides, a hairbraiding salon is a service, like an auto body shop in a community.
Just lay off the stupidity at some point, then maybe you will learn something rather than spouting out nonsense nonstop.
Troll Radicals don't want to learn something. They've been taught to taunt & distract US, while their destructive obama hub destroys us with socialist legislation. When we use reason, they laugh at us because they won the game. Take care From_Georgia. Oh and, Impeach Obama & all socialists!
Much of the over regulation can be attributed to Attorneys and Accountants protecting each other. Making things so complicated you have to pay up to 300.00 an hour to cut the red tape in order to hang a roll of toilet paper. Is it the proper height to accomodate the disabled? Is it too far from the toilet? Does it carry an extra roll in case the dispensor runs out?
We're turning this around mtv22. There are millions like U.S., who don't use computers, who will be out in full force in Nov! to give good people like you, your life back. Hang on. America needs entrepeneurs like you!
Entrepeneurship kills Dictatorships. Obamites will fight dirty, but they'll lose this time!
It would be a good day to impeach Obama, but it would be better to get rid of the controllers of our puppet president. Since there is a good chance Obama is just being used until the progressives find someone better at leading their cause.
We do need to get rid of socialism/marixism/communism once and for all, and actually get this country great once again.
Why does everything come down to racism with you. Our last conversation kept leading back to the State of Israel and how they are causing all the trouble in the middle east. You seem to have a lot of hate built up feel it necessary to share it with others.
Lets try this route, how do you suggest to improve our economy and please do not just rail about Israel.
government is only serious about redistribution of wealth and keeping their jobs
Anarchism is just the paranoia raging against the machine inside your head
They would be perfectly happy if they could force all the citizen equally into slavery to the elitist government officials. They do not like it when people start to solve their own problems because that leads to them not being dependent on them. They do not like it when businesses succeed because that also leads people to not be dependent on them.
These people will be only happy when every one is solely dependent on the government for all aspects of their living needs. These people only crave power over the every one else and if you are not in their little club you are part of every one else they want to control.
I have never considered wanting dominion over anyone but I am rethinking my philosophy. I believe I would like to have dominion over the traitorous scum that perverts our great country and subverts our Constitution. I would only like to re-educate them, LOL.
Killing markets is killing freedom.
The severe meddling into markets Obama is doing is killing markets and freezing them. This is having devastating effects. No one will invest and participate in markets that are being intervened into by the government because that is not a real market. The money sits on the sidelines or goes overseas, it is not circulating in the fake economy.
We're doomed if this continues because the deflationary effects are severe and real. The M3 is at great depression levels already. The Fed stopped tracking it 4 years ago, perhaps for good reason, but others are tracking it and know what it is. The same way we know real unemployment is closer to 16%, not 9.5%.
.
Jobs are jobs, you racist obsessed twit.
Re-educating these people would be a great challenge due to the fact their beliefs are almost religious in nature to them. The first thing we would have to do is to get them to think rationally and not emotionally, that my friend is a very steep mountain to climb but I would gladly help you climb that mountain.
Me too! Our tax money can go to teaching in History camps, and all about our founding fathers.
Explain the constitution and why it IS important! You know? Such educational things like that!
Something a bit related to that, but myself and other members here have asked these progressives/liberals about suggestions to fix what ever problem is in the article, yet none of them have come up with one. Then they claim no one here comes up with suggestions yet, many members here give plenty and most are rather simple and obvious fixes.
So then, instead of debating the suggestion or giving one of their own opinion, they instead jump to either racism or play party line games to avoid the debate and claim to know everything yet know nothing.
Just a suggestion, should I take psycology in school. LOL
Trying to figure out these lib/prog will give you a head ache that can only be cured with ample amounts of your favorite elixir. This trolls favorite thread to is blame Israel for all our problems in the mid east and also to blame free trade as to why our manufacturing jobs have gone over seas.
I honestly never expected an answer but like to try anyways and the hope that one day the light will come on and reality will set in for the trolls, I know lofty goals that probably will never be achieved.
Much earlier in my life I had a close friend who was a Cosmetology Instructor, thus I'm somewhat informed on
subjects relating to that field and related businesses.
I'm all for deregulation in some cases, but limited regulation in others. This hair braiding salon deal is some-
what worrisome however. The braiding is only the final result of the salon visit. Folks who are allowed to work
on hair should be trained to recognize conditions and circumstances that would prevent them from working on
a select few customers, and without the proper education I'm afraid they will not be aware of these important
points. Training also educates cosmetologist in proper equipment sterilization methods and their importance. But in the spirit of entrepreneurial freedom, I suppose customers will figure it out themselves when they catch
a case of head lice, or some obscure scalp disease while visiting their local hair braiding salon.
Let the buyer beware.
After all. when oCare is fully implemented we'll all be looking for a 'shaman' for our every-day healthcare needs.
Who needs regulations? BTW, I suspect these regs were State imposed rather than Federal.
Challenge indeed. Perhaps we could start with teaching them what it is to put in an honest day of labor.
Another typical idiotic lie-beral. yes, this DOES grow the economy. ANY job given to the government shrinks the economy as the gov't PRODUCES NO WEALTH! it confiscates and destroys wealth creation, something you libs are so fond of, but it generates absolutely no wealth at all.
You can scoff at the degree of wealth produced, but at least it is being produced, and for every example like this, there are thousands more. That multiplier is a powerful factor. Of course, you don't realize that small businesses are the main source of jobs in the private sector, hence your ignorant conceited scornful reply.
liberalism – destroying nations for centuries
History camps, I like that. Economics and free enterprise classes as well. Afterwards there will be movies from the real Mao, Stalin, Hitler and Pol Pot. The real Che Guevara and Castro’s Cuba for entertainment.
Hold the phone you sir you have just crossed the line, you can not use honest when referring to these people. Do you understand the effects of even thinking of associating the word honesty with these people? If honesty was an animal these people would never believe it exist kinda like the tooth fairy, santa cluase, the easter bunny, etc……
Gov't creates NO jobs that help the economy. All it can do is get in the way of private sector job creation, and destroy jobs. This has been seen time and time again. Gov't produces NO wealth. ALL wealth is created in the private sector. The gov't only confiscates wealth and causes wealth destruction. Furthermore, any money used by the gov't is done as inefficiently as possible because there are no market factors in play. They don't have to produce or be eaten alive by competitors because it is a monopoly on all its services. When the postal service went private and ate the gov't's lunch, the gov't responded by CREATING a monopoly !! Imagine the lie-beral outrage if a private company did that.
And cheetos for their snack to make them feel at home in their mommy's basement.
I think reality will hit them, but only when its too late though. Since it is quite likely that those prog/libs that are the elites and are in power will take their advantage and throw everyone under the bus including their supporters.
But you are right that is it harder to convence them to see things from the other side before things get worse and they will be forced to go against what they once supported. It is just too bad that they are woefully unware that they are being used either by the politicians, unions or other anti-america group.
What was I thinking. Ahhhhg! the despair… LOL
They are cheeto eaters now aren't they? LOL No more mommy's basement though.
Thats OK we all have made this mistake as a matter of fact I think you corrected me on this very same mistake at least three or four time in the past.
I am afraid thought that if we do not start changing what the next generation is learning we will be driven deeper into the hole that is being created. Eventually the dirt that is being thrown out will start to come back into the hole and bury this great country, we can not allow this to happen.
That's progressives for you. They need the mountains of paperwork to justify their existence and control over the masses.
I will will throw in one more agency: Consumer protection. I am not a believer in the principle of Caveat Emptor.
Good idea
Almost sounds as if you are talking about OSHA, a truly nightmarish federal waste of taxpayer money.
Most government jobs are parasitic and leeches on the tax paying private sector. Want to cut costs? Outsource non security govt jobs to the private sector. That will save the billions annually.
What a wonderful way to help your community, by bringing jobs in. These people have found a way to use a good idea or skill to make a living and help others along the way. This used to be the norm. What happened to all of us?
Well, Israel is a racist nation. The equivalent would be a White homeland created in Africa using ethnic cleansing. Even their ally, Apartheid South Africa, wasn't doing that and yet gained the outrage of the world – conveniently ignoring their "ally" even after they sold them a nuclear weapon! Maybe that is where Oliver Stone gets his ideas?
Find me a news article that speaks of a White person serving "their community" with that community being WHITE people and I won't post here for a week. If the reverse is racist, the the original one is.
Sounds like you are racIST obsessed.
That didn't take long. You shouldn't talk about History you know nothing about.
And golfing!!
"To Obama, if the job does not involve the Government and a union (AFSCME, SEIU, NEA or ACT, etc), than it's not a real job." – fixed it for ya. In Illinois, there was a plan afoot to force parents who were caretakers of their severely disabled children into union (SEIU) membership. Fortunately, it appears to have gone nowhere.
How about looking through this thread and finding out WHO brought up anything racist.
Why does it ALWAYS have to be about race with you??? Hmmmm????
I sure didn't. Is it racist to bring up race? Only if you are White?
As for the economy I have often said:
Stop aid to Israel (and that would allow stopping aid to Egypt)
Stop fighting wars for Israel
Raise tariffs
Kick out the illegals
Is it, because again – YOU brought up that something in the article "assumed" to be racist. (scroll up – the "community" wording)
Why did that trigger your racist remark?? Is that the FIRST thing you thought of when you read that? "OMG – that writer used a term that I think is racist, so that means the write MUST be racist!!!"
Give it up, we all see right through you.
See most all the rest of us actually read the article and though about all the government RED TAPE that was the entire POINT of the article. But you….YOU thought it's all about someone skin color.
So who's the racist??
Would stop foreign aided to other countries as well as Israel?
Should we not fight in any war that is not directly against the USA?
If tariffs are raised on all products that are imported to the US are you willing to to pay higher cost for the products manufactured inside the borders of the US?
How would you go about deporting illegal immigrants?
Is it even possible for you to post in ANY thread about ANY subject without defaulting to your lame Israel bunk?? Really, is it??
You dont need to find an article for that. My uncle owns an auto repair shop in Yukon, OK, and that is a white man serving his community.
Can you give up on this needless racist fight. All your doing is making yourself look more and more like an idiot each time you post. So, just save yourself the trouble and either stop posting racist crap or actually get a life.
God, you racist liberals are idiots.
Its funny, the racist obsessed is calling someone else racially obsessed.
If only talkzalot just looked in the mirror and there he will find someone racially obsessed.
Dude, you are too damn easy.
Thanks for doing that…
I "forgot" that, in actuality, Unions and the Guber'ment are really one and the same…
Would stop foreign aided to other countries as well as Israel?
Compared to the aid we give Israel alone, it is insignificant. The tiny illegitimate UN creation that was created with terror and ethnic cleansing and has attacked and betrayed us time and again receives more than any other nation.
Should we not fight in any war that is not directly against the USA?
You think we should????
If tariffs are raised on all products that are imported to the US are you willing to to pay higher cost for the products manufactured inside the borders of the US?
Yep, that is the end-all be-all of life – saving a nickel on something. Nevermind that you are likely to pay FAR FAR FAR more than you EVER saved with cheap junk due to the financial crisis which is due largely to people losing their jobs. So sell out your neighbor for the promise of paying a nickel less when you go to a big-box store. Actually, you don't. Funny how there is LESS competition now that America has been destroyed – but that is what DUMPING is about. Americans are so thick and behind the curve on this issue but the Asians are laughing.
How would you go about deporting illegal immigrants?
Same way Eisenhower did. Round them up, deport them. What is confusing about this process?
The article states the person is an African hair braider. So, is she in Africa?
Maj. Gen.Jerry R Curry (Ret.) Speaks Out On The Obama Eligibility Issue
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fO8n4Pij158
You're outa here for a week. Local food-store chain here in Richmond, Virginia – Ukrop's. Just recently sold to Martin's (a Giant subsidiary), but for 30-plus years, the white-owned (privately/family-owned) grocery chain, which grew to nearly 30 stores, was heralded time and again in the press and other venues for SERVING THE COMMUNITY:
employing people with disabilities, sending people to college, donating-donating-donating, sponsoring the wildly successful Ukrop's Monument Avenue 10K, Christmas parade — just a glimpse from Wikipedia: Each year, Ukrop's gave a minimum of 10 percent of its pre-tax profits to the community. Part of this donation took place through the "Golden Gift Program". Customers shopped at the store during a certain period of time and received points for their purchases. They then could choose who their "points" went to. This did include churches, nonprofits or other community organizations. The money was distributed accordingly.
Heralded time and again but you have no proof. Fail.
Serving "THE" community is not serving "THEIR" community. Double fail.
They don't maintain the roads or do air traffic control very well at all. High cost, poor service, political decisions make higher costs.
Privatize it all, freedom in the marketplace. Even consumer protection is a red herring.
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