John Kerry: ‘The Guy Who Put the “Entrepreneurship” in the Senate Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship’

As a small business owner, I've long appreciated John Kerry's advocacy for small business owners and entrepreneurs. It's tough for the little folks like myself to compete with big business and it's even tougher if you're a women in business. Kerry's done a lot to fight for small business over the years as the interview below from Inc.com points out:

He's the guy who put the "entrepreneurship" in the Senate Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship. As committee chairman in 2001, Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., had the name extended to reflect its broader sense of mission. Now, with the Democratic takeover of Congress, he returns to the helm, pledging to strengthen capital programs and other opportunities for small-business owners, while fighting to give them a fair shot at federal contracts — largely by preventing Coca-Cola, Microsoft, Wal-Mart and other large corporations from scooping them up.

Kerry, a former entrepreneur himself, surprised colleagues 22 years ago for seeking a post on the low-profile committee, yet was pilloried as anti-business during his 2004 presidential bid campaign, over his support of a minimum-wage increase and curbing tax incentives for corporations. Kerry recently spoke to Inc.com staff reporter Angus Loten about raising the federal minimum wage, taming employer health-care costs, and other key issues the committee expects to take up in the year ahead.

Inc.com: What's your impression of the minimum-wage bill that was recently sent back to the House with more than $8 billion in tax breaks for small-business owners?

Kerry: Obviously, if they were free-standing, some of our colleagues would embrace the larger portion of the tax pieces. But I think there was a feeling that it should've been a clean bill. I can't predict the outcome. We'll have to see what happens in committee. That's where it will be resolved. Some of the small-business measures in the bill we've advocated in the committee and we're supportive of them.

Inc.com: Opponents have said President Bush's proposed tax cuts for employees who buy their own health insurance are a threat to the employer-based system of coverage. Are they?

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