For America’s small businesses, the stakes in this midterm election are worthy of the World Series. Owners have put their capital, their livelihoods, and their employees’ futures on the line. Candidates from both parties need to show they can do more than step up to the plate and swing. They must explain how they will deliver for America’s job-creation engine.
The One Big Beautiful Bill Act’s investment incentives and the Trump administration’s regulatory streamlining efforts provide a foundation to build upon. Permanent 100% expensing for eligible equipment, restored immediate deductions for domestic research, and deductions for qualifying production facilities strengthen the financial case for expansion. Reducing unnecessary regulatory burdens can help owners put those incentives to work. Main Street needs two more years of forward movement.
Investment is already showing strength. Business equipment spending grew at a 13.4% annualized rate in the second quarter. Employers are investing in productive capacity. The responsibility now is to help more small businesses turn that investment into orders, expansion, and paychecks. That is how progress reaches working families and helps put sustained 3% growth within reach.
Construction illustrates the opportunity. Adding ADP’s original monthly employment estimates from January through September produces a gain of 106,000 construction jobs. Manufacturing’s gains and losses totaled a decline of 12,000, despite an increase in September. These are sums of the initial monthly estimates, not ADP’s revised year-to-date totals, but the contrast matters: building capacity and sustaining factory hiring are separate challenges, and America must succeed at both.
Smaller employers are doing substantial hiring. Across those same original ADP releases, establishments with fewer than 50 employees accounted for 379,000 net additional jobs. Including midsized establishments with 50 to 499 employees brings the total to 503,000. Behind those numbers are owners accepting the responsibility of another payroll and workers gaining another opportunity.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics provides a separate view. Its September report showed manufacturing employment up 72,000 since December and construction adding 11,000 jobs last month. Yet overall employment rose just 29,000, while revisions erased 60,000 previously reported gains from July and August. ADP and BLS use different methods, so their estimates should be assessed separately. The national hiring slowdown nevertheless makes strengthening Main Street an urgent priority.
A factory’s economic reach extends through the businesses that supply, equip, maintain, and serve it. Those employers must purchase equipment, train workers, and cover payroll before new business pays off. When they can expand alongside a major investment, opportunity spreads. When financing, permitting, or regulatory costs hold them back, communities capture less of the promise.
That is the test candidates should face through November. Anyone seeking a two-year House term or a six-year Senate term should explain what they will do to make the next small-business hire possible. Supporting Main Street requires commitments owners can evaluate before election night and hold lawmakers to afterward.
Start with permitting. Which overlapping approvals will candidates work to consolidate? What deadlines will they support? Who will be accountable when agencies issue conflicting requirements or leave applications unresolved? Protecting workers and communities must accompany a process that reaches dependable decisions. An owner waiting indefinitely for permission to expand cannot give a prospective employee a start date.
Then address the cost of compliance. A 10-person company cannot absorb the same administrative demands as a national corporation. Candidates should identify requirements they would simplify, duplication they would eliminate, and ways to scale compliance to a business’s size and risk. Essential protections should come with clear instructions that owners can follow without diverting scarce resources from their workers.
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Access to capital deserves equally concrete answers. An investment deduction cannot finance an equipment purchase on its own. Owners still need credit on terms their businesses can carry. Candidates should explain how their policies will support small-business lending and give employers confidence to make commitments that extend beyond the next election.
For Main Street, winning this World Series means more businesses expanding, more workers getting hired, and more families getting ahead. Candidates from both parties must explain how they will build on the progress already made and deliver two more years of policies that help the U.S.’s job creators thrive. Small-business owners have put their capital and their livelihoods on the line. The next Congress must help bring opportunity home.
Dan Varroney is an economic strategist, founder and CEO of Potomac Core, and author of Rethinking Economic Growth.
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[ H/T Washington Examiner ]
