The Small Business Watchdog

Business Insider recently published an article drawing on data compiled by the Office of Advocacy to show an interesting caveat that applies to analyses of all businesses—nonemployers and employers combined. “In 2010,” the article reads, “21.7 million U.S. businesses were without employees, while only 5.6 million had them. At 79 percent of all American companies, [...]

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Delaware’s 70,000 small businesses can now sleep a little easier, as a new executive order makes state regulations less burdensome. This is big news for Delaware. Small businesses represent 92 percent of Delaware employers and employ 170,000 workers, or 46.1 percent of all private sector jobs. They contribute significantly to Delaware’s real gross state product [...]

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On June 19, the Office of Advocacy’s Request for Quotations (RFQ) for economic research was posted on FedBizOpps.gov. These RFQs, described below, are for competitive contracts and are not research grants. The deadline for submitting proposals is Thursday, July 18, 2012, at 4 p.m. Eastern (2 p.m. Mountain).
There are several ways to view the proposals: [...]

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Advocacy has just published its Small Business Quarterly Bulletin with data through first quarter 2012. 

While small firms with 20-499 employees provided three-quarters of the net employment growth since the end of the downturn, more recently, even the very small firms (fewer than 20 employees) and large firms (500 or more employees) showed solid net [...]

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Can shouting out random words in a group of nearly 200 people help start a company?  That’s how the folks at Startup Weekend, a Seattle-based nonprofit, get attendees at their events to “warm up” for a weekend of rolling up your sleeves, getting down to business, and staying up all night to build a company [...]

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On May 30, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) issued Notice 2012-40 to provide guidance on health flexible spending arrangements (health FSAs).  Among other things, the IRS notice requests comments on the potential modification of the “use or lose rule” for health FSAs.  Currently, the use-or-lose rule prohibits any contribution or benefit under an FSA from [...]

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On May 10, President Obama issued an executive order requiring federal agencies to publish a semiannual notice of significant regulations that have undergone review by each agency. E.O. 13610, “Identifying and Reducing Regulatory Burdens,” is the latest in a series of executive orders and memoranda on the subject of regulatory review. The new executive order [...]

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Across this nation, we have large and small; east and west; oceans, lakes and mountains; and people whose goals make us thrive, grow, and move forward. Our natural curiosity, creativity and desire to succeed has fostered an environment of small business growth over generations, back to our country’s founding. These small businesses built our great [...]

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On June 1, the Office of Advocacy submitted comments on the Office of Management and Budget’s request for information on Federal Participation in the Development and Use of Voluntary Consensus Standards and In Conformity Assessment Activities. Advocacy also published a fact sheet summarizing the letter.
Also on June 1, Advocacy submitted comments on the Office of [...]

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