Small Business

Floor Speech

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mrs. SHAHEEN. Mr. President, I am so pleased to join Chairman Landrieu and my colleague, Senator Ben Cardin. Hopefully, he will be able to speak after me to talk about the importance of small businesses and what we have to do to support small business in this country.

Small businesses in New Hampshire and across the country, as Senator Landrieu has said, are struggling. Of the jobs lost last year, almost 40 percent came from businesses with 50 or fewer employees. While we have taken important steps to bring back the economy from the brink of depression, sales and consumer demand are still too low and too many small business owners remain frozen out of credit markets.

This economy is not going to fully recover until our small businesses fully recover. In the past, it has been small businesses that have created most of the jobs coming out of a recession, and this recovery is going to be no different. If we want to see job growth in this country, we need to take action to help small businesses get back on their feet.

Now, as a former small business owner, I know it is business and not government that creates jobs and drives innovation and new ideas. But I also know government has an important role to play in helping small business create jobs, especially in these very difficult economic times.

Under the leadership of our chair, Senator Landrieu, who has done a great job, along with our ranking member, Senator Snowe, in the last several months the Small Business Committee has produced five major pieces of legislation to help small companies create jobs again, and Senator Landrieu has laid those out for people. I am proud to be a sponsor of all five of these bills.

They spur research and innovation. They ensure small businesses get their fair share of government contracts. They expand SBA lending programs so small businesses can obtain affordable credit. They strengthen the technical services the SBA can provide. And they help small businesses gain access to international markets to sell their goods and services.

These bills, as we have heard Senator Landrieu say, are bipartisan efforts that passed the committee with nearly unanimous votes from both Republican and Democratic members. I hope we are soon going to see these bills on the floor of the Senate and that they will pass unanimously.

All of the bills are important. But today I want to focus on what we can do to help open global markets to small business because I strongly believe that in order to have a sustained recovery from this recession, we need to expand exports. Domestic consumer demand in the United States simply will not rise to the level it was before the recession.

The good news is that the potential for export growth is enormous. Over 95 percent of the world's customers live outside of the United States. But as we saw so dramatically on that chart Senator Landrieu just showed, only about 1 percent of small businesses export their goods and services, and small companies that do export usually only sell to one foreign market, while larger companies typically sell to five or more foreign markets.

Emerging markets in developing countries such as China, India, and Brazil offer great opportunities for growth. By 2020, about 90 percent of the world's population will live in emerging markets. There is a huge potential for smaller companies to tap these markets to grow their businesses and to create jobs.

I have long been an advocate for exporting because international markets are very important to New Hampshire. I was the first Governor to lead a trade mission from New Hampshire overseas, and those trade missions I led brought back about $500 million in sales for New Hampshire businesses.

Small business generates almost half of New Hampshire's total exports, and we have some great success stories.

Dartware, a software developer in West Lebanon, on the western side of our State, first started exporting to Canada--which neighbors New Hampshire, for those people who are not sure on their geography. Now they sell to more than 80 countries. During this recession, exporting has made a huge difference on their bottom line. Last year, their international sales were 33 percent of their total sales. This past January, export sales represented 63 percent or almost double their total sales.

Another company, a small business called Sky-Skan, in Nashua, designs and produces state-of-the-art technologies for planetariums. You would not think there would be that many planetariums around the world, but they have exported their products and services to over 120 countries. Even in the midst of one of the most difficult economies in our Nation's history, Sky-Skan was able to bring on 10 new employees.

In his State of the Union speech, President Obama set a goal of doubling American exports in the next 5 years. He recently signed an executive order creating an Export Promotion Cabinet. I strongly support those efforts. I know other members of the Small Business Committee do as well.

A recent World Bank study found that each dollar spent on export promotion and assistance brought a fortyfold return. Right now, the United States spends considerably less than the international average in helping small businesses export. Government export promotion and assistance is a smart investment that helps create jobs. One of the important actions we need to take in the Senate to help improve export promotion is to quickly enact the Small Business Export Enhancement and International Trade Act of 2009--one of those five pieces of legislation Senator Landrieu laid out.

We need to make the SBA a more valuable resource for small businesses looking to export their goods and services, and this bill does just that. I hope as these bills come to the floor of the Senate, we will take a close look and we will recognize that if we are going to help small businesses export, then we have to give them the tools to do that. This legislation does that. It helps small companies finance their exports by increasing loan limits and guarantees in SBA export loan programs and expanding the number of SBA finance specialists who are posted around the country.

This bill directs the SBA to collaborate more with other agencies that provide services and programs for small exporters--something the SBA has begun doing under the leadership of Administrator Karen Mills.

More U.S. exports abroad mean more jobs at home. We can and must do more. We must do it smarter to help small companies compete globally. If we do not, we risk falling behind, and our economy, our businesses, and our families will lose out.

Mr. President, I yield the floor and look forward to hearing from my colleague, Senator Cardin.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source