In the next several weeks you will be reading and hearing more about the South Carolina Electric & Gas (SCE&G) proposed overall electric rate hike of 6.61%. Many of you will complain that if we just deregulated the energy market and stop forcing residential and commercial customers to get their energy from SCE&G, Duke, Progress […]
Energy deregulation hype busted Read More »
For those of you in the South Carolina Electric & Gas (SCE&G) territory, get ready to mark your calendars. The power company is asking for an overall rate increase of 6.6% on electricity for its 660,000 customers. For small businesses the rate hike would be 4.19% and residential customers would pay a whopping 7.35% more for
SCE&G wants more of your money Read More »
The efforts in Congress to eviscerate regulations that protect small businesses and consumers continue. The letter below from the American Sustainable Business Council oulines the danger of S.3468. This bill may soon go through a markup so if you want to weigh in, do so now. American Sustainable Business Council August 28, 2012Dear Members of the
Stop needed regulations now, big problems tomorrow Read More »
As the party conventions roll out this week and next, big business and its lobbying organizations like the Business Roundtable will be making big political donations and entertaining the influential in style. Their collective message, says Donald Cohen, will be about “the ‘burden’ and ‘uncertainty’ of government action to remove toxic air pollution, stop climate
Recipe of obstruction Read More »
The workers’ compensation insurance industry and SCE&G both have hearings in the coming months regarding their requests for more revenue. The South Carolina Small Business Chamber of Commerce (SCSBCC) and its president and CEO, Frank Knapp Jr., will intervene to oppose both rate hikes. The SCSBCC is joining the S.C. Consumer Advocate’s Office in pushing
Opposing workers’ comp and SCE&G rate hikes Read More »
Back in early 2010 when many of us were working to pass financial reform in Congress, we were calling for “banks to be banks not gambling houses” (see my op.eds in The Hill and the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette). The great recession largely resulted from bank deregulation in the 1990s that repealed the 1933 Glass-Steagall Act that
Gold that should have never been chased Read More »
Tomorrow the U.S. House is scheduled to vote on H.R. 4078, the Regulatory Freeze Act. The legislation would stop the federal government from promulgating any new regulations until the unemployment rate is 6% or below. If this bill should ever become law, which it won’t, the coal and oil companies, health insurance companies, big pharma,
Oppose the Regulatory Freeze Act—NOW! Read More »
Efforts to blame regulations for the economy have been raging for quite a while in Congress and on the campaign trails. Clearly the rhetoric of “job-killing regulations” has been used by partisans to score political points. And just as clearly small businesses, as seen in most polling, have said regulations are not holding them back
Anti-regulation folks have chance to be specific or shut up Read More »
South Carolina Congressman Mick Mulvaney held a field hearing in Rock Hill, SC, yesterday titled “Caught Up in Red Tape: The Impact of Federal Regulations on Small Businesses and Contractors”. Mr. Mulvaney is the Chairman of the Small Business Subcommittee on Contracting and Workforce. I wasn’t able to attend the meeting but did have a
Congressional field hearing yields real small business issues Read More »
Let’s continue with the healthcare reform theme I’ve been addressing all week. On Tuesday, U.S. Senator John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) had an opinion piece in The Hill in which he listed four important principles of healthcare reform GOP-style. First, lower the costs of healthcare. Duh. While very little of Obamacare has kicked in to address lowering
Obamcare critics have nothing new to offer Read More »
