Jobs, Small Business | featured news

Senators rejected dueling Democratic and Republican small-business tax cut plans on Thursday, the latest futile effort to break the election-year gridlock that’s consumed Capitol Hill on issues dealing with jobs and the economy... “There is no reason for [Republicans] to have killed this bill other than they are trying to hurt President Obama, small businesses and the middle class,” Reid, who introduced the bill, said at a news conference.

President Obama has signed into law a bill aimed at giving small businesses more access to capital, touting the measure as a step toward job creation and a sign of hope for bipartisan cooperation in Washington.

The U.S. labor market could stay sluggish for a while, with small-business executives reluctant to hire amid the murky economic outlook, a Chamber of Commerce survey showed.

The GOP gubernatorial candidate promises to cut spending and suggests that lower taxes and less regulation will spur business. But experts say the bleak economy is mostly due to the real estate crisis.

In the wake of a new jobs report showing increased unemployment, President Obama today said the steps his administration has taken to improve the economy are working, but not fast enough. He called on Congress to pass a small business bill and said he would announce next week a broader set of ideas to accelerate job creation.

Signs of a recovery in the U.S. labor market grew on Wednesday as data on the private sector labor market showed job gains for the first time since January 2008.

President Barack Obama proposed on Tuesday small business tax cuts, fresh infrastructure spending and energy efficiency rebates to boost jobs, but there were few details on the scale or cost of the measures.