⚡ Make Americans Owners Again

Let’s build a movement to make small businesses great again!

Over the last 50 years small businesses have been under attack. The financialization of our community businesses, the over-regulation to stop competition and the centralization of power in Wall Street, and away from Main Street, needs to stop. This is our chance to take back our local businesses, return money to our communities and not live in one giant corporate or private equity owned strip mall.

What is happening? According to The Atlantic, private equity in 2000 owned 4% of America’s businesses, by 2020 they owned 20%. We believe in capitalism but we want an even playing field for the little guys. But it’s not just Wall Street. Over the last four years, small businesses have been burdened with $1.7 trillion in regulatory costs and 326 million hours of paperwork nationwide3. Ridiculous. Does a hair braider in Louisian really need to complete a 500 hour accredited hair braiding program (average cost $8,000) AND pass an exam that costs $25 annually?

We believe we need to De-financialize. De-centralize. De-regulate. What do you think we need to do to make real change?

Buy Local, Own Local Campaign

We need a campaign that goes beyond what Amex’s Shop Small or Small Business Saturday campaigns do. If we had one of these, ideally it could do the following: Educate consumers about the importance of supporting locally-owned businesses Create a national database of locally-owned businesses for easy consumer access Develop a certification program for truly local businesses to distinguish them from corporate chains Encourage local governments to prioritize contracts with small, locally-owned businesses

Bobby Graham 12 months ago