As published today on OdwyerPR.
As a 34-year-old, born-and-bred New Yorker, as I read the details of Barack Obama’s stimulus plan, many memories come to mind. A product of the NYC public school system, I have worked hard for my money, and according to government classifications am “rich”, as I have made many sacrifices to get to where I am. I’ve weathered failed friendships, dwindling family time, and many others sacrifices entrepreneurs make, and I am sure these self-sacrifices will continue.
Growing up in a Bronx household where my mother worked very hard, we were “latchkey” kids. I worked 40 hours a week from the age of 11 in a local pizzeria run by a 30-something, hardworking Italian immigrant. This man saved his money to open the business and worked 90 hours a week there to send his two young children to Catholic school. My mom was the daughter of Holocaust survivors, who had instilled in her a unique endurance, but she was stubborn and refused to ever accept help from anyone. It had to always be her way, and she refused to lose. We never asked nor received any help from the government. My mother raised my sister and me to believe in ourselves, and she sacrificed herself tremendously so we could advance.
Prior to entering the field of Public Relations, I had one job. I worked in that same local pizzeria every day until I was 23 years old. Summers? Eighty hours a week doing dishes, mopping floors, and delivering pizza. Though it was grueling, I loved it and wouldn’t change it for the world. But from a young age, I promised myself my children would never want for anything.
I was blessed to be accepted to an elite NYC public school, Stuyvesant HS. I managed to avoid attending my local Bronx high school, described at the time as “one of the most dangerous high schools in the country,” by taking the subway system an hour and a half each day in the pre-Rudy Giuliani NYC. Those were the lovely days of boom-boxes, graffiti and muggings every minute. From the age of 14, I learned to navigate those causeways safely in order to reach school. In high school, I met driven, focused young people for the first time, and was inspired to work harder. Despite being accepted to numerous elite private colleges, I attended a NY State School, which I graduated from in 3 years after working hours and hours. Memories of my mother clipping coupons, always picking up pennies from the floor, having me return bottles for the 5 cent return (in the pre-green days), and never using credit cards because you never knew if you’d be able to pay the bills remain in my mind then and now.
I started my agency, 5W Public Relations, in 2003. Since then, it has grown to become one of the 20 largest independent PR agencies in the U.S., ending 2008 with nearly $12 million in revenue. We have no debt, pay all vendors on time, and have always had a profitable business, as we work very hard and deliver results. We don’t accept complacency; we demand and deliver. We have never had a line of credit, don’t carry credit card balances and pay our bills.
Government to date has affected my firm in many ways: we have footed the bill for jury duty for countless employees; we have matched Medicare tax rates (with little faith the system will exist when most of my employees will eventually need it); and as my firm grew, we paid extra commercial real estate taxes. Yet, we have always followed the letter of the law and kept forging forth.
Over the last few months, my firm, like many other companies across the world, has seen our business depreciate. We have lost clients due to finances, collections have become much harder, and we have had layoffs. Yesterday, the stimulus package arrived at my business. We learned that my firm will have to pay 65% of COBRA’s costs for each laid-off employee, eventually to be reimbursed in some form of tax credits (as a business owner I pay and pay and pay – and never seem to get credits). This stimulus package adds bills to my business, which is already down and suffering from lower cash flow.
I hear about New York’s governor proposing to raise taxes another 4 percent and Obama consumed with the popular tale of “taxing the rich.” Growing up in NYC, I always viewed the rich as elite folks who were billionaires – Rockefellers who ran humongous publicly-traded corporations – not my boss from 20 years ago, who owns seven local pizzerias and surely makes more than the $250,000 a year our President and Governor deem as the salary of the rich. These so-called rich are the people who create jobs and who sacrifice. People who work hard.
Today’s government is putting more strain on the hardworking entrepreneur. It is taxing energetic people who sacrifice every day to create opportunities for others as well as themselves. This is simply not the answer to the nation’s devastating problems. Countless small businesses are comatose and need stimulation; it’s not their responsibility to bail out individuals. The drivers of the American economy aren’t the poor and the jobless, but the entrepreneurs who create the opportunities for these jobless Americans.
The new government taxes will result in more job losses. They will penalize the productive and give needlessly to the unproductive. They will relinquish an entrepreneur’s motivation to work even harder to provide jobs. This political hurricane sweeping through our businesses will change the country’s landscape for the worse. It’s nothing more than un-American. (And by the way, don’t forget, when I die, my kids will be taxed another 50 percent on my money.)
Ronn Torossian
5WPR
