We just learned that our economy grew at a rate of 2 percent over the last three months. We’ve had nine consecutive months of private sector job growth, after nearly two years of job loss. But as we continue to dig out from the worst recession in 80 years, our mission is to accelerate that recovery and encourage more rapid growth, so that businesses can continue to prosper and we can get the millions of Americans who are still looking for jobs back to work.
Now, I don’t believe that government can or should guarantee the success of any company. Success has to be earned. It has to be earned the old-fashioned way through great ideas and hard work and great employees.
But there are times, like in the past few years, when our economy is hit with as devastating a blow as we’ve seen – when credit is frozen, when demand is stalled – that we’ve got a responsibility to offer temporary and targeted incentives to spur investment, to knock down the barriers that stand in your way, and to help create the conditions you need to grow and to hire and to prosper. And that’s what we’ve done.
Since I took office, we’ve cut taxes for small businesses 16 times – 16 different tax cuts for small businesses. Instead of providing tax breaks for companies that are shipping jobs overseas, we’re giving tax breaks to encourage companies to invest right here in the United States of America – in small businesses, in clean energy firms, in manufacturers. And we’ve taken steps to expand lending to small businesses, which, even with good credit, continue to have difficulty borrowing the capital they need to grow.
It’s been just over one month since I signed the Small Business Jobs Act into law. And in that month, just one month, through just one provision in that bill, the Small Business Administration, the SBA, has supported nearly $3 billion in new loans to more than 5,000 small businesses across the country. That’s fast.
That same initiative also accelerated $55 billion in new tax relief for businesses that make job-creating investments over the next year, including by extending a provision in the Recovery Act called business expensing, or bonus depreciation. This is a pretty simple concept. It allows a business to immediately deduct 50 percent of the cost of certain investments like new equipment. That means that they’re going to have additional money to invest in workers and in other plants and equipment.
This is not a shot in the dark. A new report from the Treasury Department estimates that it will accelerate $150 billion in tax cuts for 2 million businesses, large and small, around the country. It would temporarily lower the average cost of investment by more than 75 percent for companies, creating a powerful new incentive for businesses to invest more right now – perhaps about $50 billion – which will generate more jobs and more growth.
Political season is going to be over soon. And when it does, all of us are going to have a responsibility, Democrats and Republicans, to work together wherever we can to promote jobs and growth.
The idea I’m advancing today is one that both Democrats and Republicans should be able to support. In fact, Republicans have actually offered this idea in the past. It’s a simple proposal that will make a serious difference. It will encourage business investment right now. It will create jobs right now. It will help our economy grow right now.
And when many of our friends and neighbors are still navigating through some tough times, that’s what America needs right now.
Edited from reamrks made at Stromberg Metal Works, Beltsville, Md. on October 29.
