Jobs & Business Policy Quotes

Free Market

Bernie Sanders

• "I think there is obviously an enormously important role for the free market and for entrepreneurial activity. I worry how free the free market is. In sector after sector, you have a small number of companies controlling a large part of the sector." BSI

Hillary Clinton

• "Launch a national effort to cut the red tape holding small businesses back...Provide targeted tax relief for small businesses and simplify tax filing" HCW

Donald Trump

• "I’m a free trader. I believe in it but we have to be smart and we have to use smart people to negotiate." RD6

Ted Cruz

• "Republicans are and should be the party of small business and of entrepreneurs" TCS
• "We are facing what I consider to be the epic battle of our generation, quite literally the battle over whether we remain a free market nation." TCS

Jeb Bush

• "We should let market forces, not crony capitalism, decide where to invest and how to incentivize citizens to conserve." JBS

Marco Rubio

• "Every nation on the Earth that embraces market economics and the free enterprise system is pulling millions of its people out of poverty. The free enterprise system creates prosperity, not denies it." MRS

Ben Carson

• "If you let the economy work the way it's supposed to in a free market environment, there'll be plenty of jobs and people determine their own value by what they know and what they are capable of doing. BCS

Unemployment Rate

Donald Trump

• "Don’t believe these phony numbers when you hear 4.9 and 5 percent unemployment. The number’s probably 28, 29, as high as 35. In fact, I even heard recently 42 percent." DTS

John Kasich

• "The anemic growth we have today isn't because the federal government failed to do enough but because it succeeded in doing too much" TS

Marco Rubio

• "Washington went along with his prescription for joblessness, which was the stimulus package, and unemployment is higher than it was when he took over, significantly higher. In fact, we have not had unemployment this high for this long since the Great Depression, with no signs of it getting better." POL

Small Businesses

Ted Cruz

• “Imagine instead of economic stagnation, booming economic growth. Instead of small businesses going out of business in record numbers, imagine small businesses growing and prospering.” (politifact)

Ben Carson

• “The current regulatory climate has harmed the ability of small businesses to grow and create jobs. For example, small businesses cannot expand beyond 50 employees without facing significant economic consequences from Obamacare. I believe removing such burdensome regulations would boost small businesses and help jumpstart the economy." (BCW-SB)

Jeb Bush

• "You think about the regulatory cost and the tax cost--that's why small businesses are closing, rather than being formed in our country right now. The big corporations have the scale to deal with all of this." (OTI-JB)
• "The past 4 years have not been kind to small businesses. Republicans should bring their message of low taxes and moderate regulatory policies to Hispanic communities whose economic future depends on such policies." (OTIC)

Marco Rubio

• "Unfortunately, American small businesses, like the broader American economy, are struggling. In recent years, more businesses are being destroyed than created."(MRW)
• "Simplifying our tax code will help the middle class, because it will make it easier for small businesses to hire and grow. And we agree with the President that we should lower our corporate tax rate, which is one of the highest in the world, so that companies will start bringing their money and their jobs back here from overseas."[http://www.ontheissues.org/2016/Marco_Rubio_Corporations.htm (OTI-MR)

Regulation

Donald Trump

“We're going to fight hard, we're going to negotiate tough, and we're going to do fantastically well. We're going to put our people back to work. We're going to get rid of all these ridiculous--everything is so bad--we're going to get rid of the regulations that are just destroying us. You can't breathe. You cannot breathe. You are going to be--if I'm elected President--so proud of your country again. You're going to remember this evening and you're going to say to your children and everyone else, that you were part of a movement to take back this country. And we're going to make America great again." http://www.ontheissues.org/2016/Donald_Trump_Government_Reform.htm

In his 2000 book, The America We Deserve, Trump wrote, "Most of us think the American Dream is a birthright, but without constant care and vigilance, it can and will be whittled down to nothing. The threatening agent is not some foreign power, but people who don’t understand the proper relationship between the public and private arenas. In other words, the greatest threat to the American Dream is the idea that dreamers need close government scrutiny and control. Job one for us is to make sure the public sector does a limited job, and no more."

When endorsing Mitt Romney in the 2012 presidential election, Trump commented in an op-ed in The Washington Times, "Right now, government regulations cost us annually $1.75 trillion. They constitute a stealth tax that is larger than the amount the Internal Revenue System collects every year from corporations and individuals combined. In just three years, Mr. Obama has added hugely to the annual regulatory bill." Trump supported a candidate that would "pare that back and make sure every single regulation has benefits that outweigh costs and that they don’t kill U.S. jobs."

Specifically on EPA regulations: “EPA is an impediment to both growth and jobs.” ”Environmental Protection, what they do is a disgrace. Every week they come out with new regulations." Huffington Post

Jeb Bush

“Regulations stifle small business formation, which means fewer jobs and declining incomes for hardworking Americans. There is no reason why regulators should be permitted to harm the labor market. As president, I will work to repeal onerous regulations that keep too many businesses from hiring and expanding."(JBW-J)

"We shouldn't have another financial crisis. What we ought to do is raise the capital requirements so banks aren't too big to fail. Dodd-Frank has actually done the opposite, totally the opposite, where banks now have a higher concentration of risk in assets and the capital requirements aren't high enough. If we were serious about it, we would raise the capital requirements and lessen the load on the community banks and other financial institutions." (RD4)

"Repeal Obamacare, address the root causes of health care costs and enable employers and workers to balance good benefits with fair wages."(JBW-J)

“Energy resources must be developed in a way that protects human health and the environment. Rules play an important role in making sure this is the case. But the Obama Administration’s excessive rules too often usurp state and tribal authority and go beyond what is necessary.”

Ben Carson

"Small businesses cannot expand beyond 50 employees without facing significant economic consequences from Obamacare. [Carson believes] removing such burdensome regulations would boost small businesses and help jumpstart the economy." (BCWSB)

We last year there was an additional 81,000 pages of government regulations. If you stack that up it would be a three-story building" (RD7)

Ted Cruz

"We must promote growth in the technological sector, a consistent bright spot for the U.S. economy. But we won’t realize more of that dynamic growth unless we keep the Internet free from the kind of unnecessary regulation that is strangling our health-care, energy and banking industries... one of the biggest regulatory threats to the Internet is “net neutrality.” In short, net neutrality is Obamacare for the Internet."(WPOPED)

• Would Eliminate at least 25 Agencies, Bureaus, Commissions, and other programs (TCWJ)

Marco Rubio

“Congress must rein in out-of-control regulatory agencies. It should stop delegating additional criminal lawmaking authority to regulators. The public has long understood the burden unaccountable regulators place on business & ordinary Americans. In many cases, regulations have become more consequential than the statutes that they purportedly execute. It is for this reason that I have proposed that Congress establish a national regulatory budget, which would require that new, costly regulations be offset by the repeal of other existing regulations. I have also joined many of my colleagues in supporting legislation that would require congressional review of major regulations. It is time we apply similar attention to regulations with criminal implications: Regulations should be reviewed by Congress and potentially offset by the simplification and repeal of older regulations. Better still, Congress in the future should refuse to delegate new criminal lawmaking authority to unelected regulators.” (http://www.ontheissues.org/2015_Justice.htm)

“More government isn't going to help you get ahead. It's going to hold you back. More government isn't going to create more opportunities. It's going to limit them. And more government isn't going to inspire new ideas, new businesses and new private sector jobs. It's going to create uncertainty. Because more government breeds complicated rules and laws that a small business can't afford to follow. Because more government raises taxes on employers who then pass the costs on to their employees through fewer hours, lower pay and even layoffs. And because many government programs that claim to help the middle class, often end up hurting them instead. Now does this mean there's no role for government? Of course not. It plays a crucial part in keeping us safe, enforcing rules, and providing some security against the risks of modern life. But government's role is wisely limited by the Constitution. And it can't play its essential role when it ignores those limits.” (GOP response to 2013 SOTU) http://www.ontheissues.org/2016/Marco_Rubio_Government_Reform.htm

Taken from Rubio’s webpage-https://marcorubio.com/news/marcos-plan-to-restore-sanity-and-restraint-to-regulation-a-national-regulatory-budget/ Federal regulations are out of control. With hundreds of billions of dollars in new costs imposed under the Obama administration, we have a system of regulations and rules that strangles job creation, holds down take-home pay, and puts unelected bureaucrats in charge of huge sectors of our economy. In 2014, Marco proposed a National Regulatory Budget, which would set a cap on the costs federal regulations could impose on the economy. For every dollar in costs regulators want to impose, they have to find a dollar in existing costs that they’ll repeal. Marco’s proposal would also impose a cap on each agency, so that Congress would be able to limit new regulation unless agencies, like the EPA, were willing to provide dollar-for-dollar relief. The budget would limit the costs regulators can impose on the economy, boost wages and job creation, and limit unelected regulators’ power to interfere in the economy.

Taken from Rubio’s webpage-https://marcorubio.com/issues-2/energy-policy-proposals/ Minimize Government Bureaucracy • Create a National Regulatory Budget to Limit the Power of Unelected Regulators • Stop President Obama’s Carbon Mandates

John Kasich

“Use Common Sense In Energy Regulation: Washington assumes authority that does not exist in pursuit of reckless regulations that will kill jobs. John Kasich will bring common sense and science to energy regulation in order to properly balance environmental stewardship and job creation.” (JKWE)

“Scrap extreme regulations like the Obama Administration’s Clean Power Plan: This extreme regulatory proposal will drive needed electrical generation offline before it can be replaced. It will also force costly and unnecessary controls on remaining plants that will drive up electricity costs and make entire economic sectors uncompetitive. It must be scrapped and not replaced. Regulations on energy production which are counterproductive, extreme should be repealed.” (JKWE)

Taken from Kasich’s Action Plan for “Reclaiming our Power, Money & Influence from Washington” ▪ A One-Year Moratorium: A one-year moratorium will be imposed on all major, new regulations. This will give businesses a respite from the costs of Obama Administration regulations and allow time to overhaul the regulatory process. ▪ Mandatory Cost-Benefit Analysis: The benefit of regulations must outweigh their costs. John Kasich will call on Congress to make cost-benefit analyses mandatory for all new regulations to make sure that is the case. It will also ensure greater transparency in the rulemaking process so Americans have a better understanding of the impact of new regulations. ▪ Congressional Approval For Rules Over $100 Million: John Kasich will urge Congress to enact legislation requiring it to approve any regulation that is projected to impose more than $100 million annually on the American economy. ▪ Rein-in Agency Abuses: Stronger oversight of agency rulemaking is necessary to ensure cost-benefit analyses are performed, regulations align with congressional intent and to identify and remove abusive or unreasonable regulations. ▪ Two-Year Permitting Deadline: Permits should be issued in a timely manner to reduce uncertainty for businesses. A maximum two-year deadline will be imposed for agencies to issue permits for major new infrastructure projects. ▪ Independent, Common Sense Appeals: To give job creators a fair chance when they object to an agency’s permitting, enforcement or other regulatory action, John Kasich will create new appointed common sense reviews comprised of real Americans. Today a small business that wants to fight an agency decision can sue in federal court and go bankrupt hiring lawyers, or it must often use an agency’s own appeals process staffed by its own bureaucrats. Only an independent administrative review can ensure businesses get fair, reasonable treatment. (JKWRR)

Bernie Sanders

- all from Bernie’s website

“Bernie Sanders believes we cannot continue to allow our nation’s wealthiest corporations to avoid paying their fair share of taxes. These companies stash tens of billions of dollars in overseas tax havens while at the same time receiving billions in subsidies. Bernie believes this is unfair and damages our economy. Instead, he argues, we should invest this money in America’s small businesses and working people.”

“Bernie Sanders has spent decades fighting for a financial system that works for ordinary people, and not just for the top 1 percent of income earners. In his view, if banks are “too big to fail,” they have an incentive to make risky investments and are therefore too big to exist. Together with Senator Elizabeth Warren, Bernie supports reinstating the Glass-Steagall Act, which instituted regulations in the aftermath of the Great Depression in an attempt to avoid another economic disaster.” • Reinstate Glass-Steagall: Separating commercial banking from investment banking will buffer normal Americans from risky investments. • Break up the Big Banks: Banks that are “too big to fail” make risky investments because they know that the American taxpayer will bail them out — and are therefore too big to exist. • Tax on Wall Street Speculation: Change the tax code to discourage short-term gambling and instead promote long-term investing. • According to Bernie Sanders, this violates the core principles of American government as “we cannot live in a vibrant democracy unless people get divergent sources of information.” To combat this problem, Bernie has consistently called out media conglomerates on their dishonest practices. He has fought for affordable cable television prices, supports net neutrality, and wants to protect and encourage independent news sources across all media platforms.

Hillary Clinton

Taken from Hillary’s website: “Unleash small business growth. Hillary’s father owned a small business—and she understands that small businesses are the backbone of jobs and growth in America. She’s put forward a small-business agenda to expand access to capital, provide tax relief, cut red tape, and help small businesses bring their goods to new markets.” (HC)

On October 8, 2015, Clinton wrote an op-ed for Bloomberg detailing her proposals for Wall Street reform. Clinton recommended protecting the Dodd-Frank Act, eliminating the carried interest tax loophole, imposing a “risk fee” on banks with more than $50 billion in assets and enacting a “high-frequency trading” tax. https://ballotpedia.org/Hillary_Clinton_presidential_campaign,_2016/Government_regulations

As president, she said, she would go "beyond Dodd-Frank" -- the regulations on financial institutions that took hold in 2010, following the economic crisis of 2007-08. She said she had been calling for financial regulations since the very early stages of the crisis. "As we all know, in the years before the crash, financial firms piled risk upon risk, and regulators in Washington either couldn’t or wouldn’t keep up," she said. "I was alarmed by this gathering storm and called for addressing risks of derivatives, cracking down on subprime mortgages and improving financial oversight." http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2015/jul/15/hillary-clinton/hillary-clinton-says-she-called-wall-street-regula/