Not So Heroic Small Businesses

Small businesses make up: 64 percent of net new private-sector jobs, 49.2 percent of private-sector employment – sba.gov

Such a blessing - All those nowhere jobs created by their greedy, one-track, entrepreneurial fervor

Totally temporary, minimum wage positions featuring both unsafe as well as toxic working conditions

Workers with absolutely no hope of sharing in whatever success might accrue to patriotic owners

Their foreheads stamped “Disposable”, just like any illegale, renter, car buyer or black convict

And praise be to those toiling so deep within those vast and dark passages of our wondrous economy

But remember that, legally, they all work at the will of the vacuous heroes of smalltime capitalism

Ever running vacuums, scraping paint or washing dishes, they share in the quiet dignity of work

We commend their Self-Responsibility while prodding their asses with the dire threat of poverty

They exercise a rightful choice to forego unaffordable insurance and then pray not to get hurt or sick

They watch their brave masters burn out on vapid children, trophy wives and costly hobbies

They are summarily fired for the slightest hint of a bad attitude or any trace of a mind of their own

Loyal for years as foremen or managers, they are indentured servants to be dismissed with nothing

Ah, small business, the engine of our economy, more than ever a perfect reflection of our society

Without health insurance or pension obligations owners enjoy a pure and unfettered competition

Laying awake at night, scheming to put off creditors while somehow speeding up their cash flow

Happy to vote to secure our borders even as they utterly depend upon swindling their illegal workers

Fiercely independent yet wedded to and fleeced by corporate finance, just like everybody else

Ducking in and out of business ahead of a few overwhelmed and underpaid public investigators

Suffering not a whisper of collective bargaining to maintain their iron fast, exploitative grips

Saving money with battered desks on tattered carpets in dark and dingy, rarely-cleaned offices

Cutting back on the coffee and paper towels, toilet tissue, janitorial services and insurance

Fielding fleets of worn-out and ill-maintained vehicles without any liability to their lowly operators

Skimming off cash tax-free while fighting any unemployment benefits for all those they discard

Writing off big lunches and new cars, grudgingly granting workers dirty kitchens and old refrigerators

Profiting well by exposing laborers to toxins every day while treating them as lowpaid untouchables

Creating most of our new jobs right along with the vast majority of our working class poverty

Wetly Judas-Kissed by a well-oiled media that’s run by invisibly-interlocked corporate entities

Spending heavily to support those who promise never to even mention raising the minimum wage

Held up by politicians as the creative fount, bedrock and engine of our most wondrous economy

Laughingly derided as chumps by their corporate betters in private glass offices, toasting bonuses

Cynically but convincingly lauded as innovative leaders by those who are really in control

Their niche innovations one by one offshored into profitable knockoffs by the Big Boys

Counting on the economic meltdown to foster a fear-driven flexibility in their frightened workers

Playing the fragile recovery card to avoid taxes, regulation, hiring and to renege on pension benefits

Wrapping the flag about themselves while mouthing how their greedy actions are truly, so patriotic

Their monomaniacal greed and bug-eyed insecurity is the real driving force of our economic power