Labeled antibusiness by Republicans and some corporate chiefs, President Obama mounted a campaign to show he wasn't. But his charm offensive has hit a rocky patch.
Business leaders gripe about burdensome new financial and health care regulations, what they see as unfriendly tax policies and vast government spending. They were put off by Obama's harsh depiction of "fat cat bankers" and "reckless practices," a label he applied both to Wall Street and oil-spill giant BP.
President Obama, who spoke Aug. 5 at the Ford Assembly Plant in Chicago, hasn't been able to shake off his anti-business label.
(Sun-Times Media)
(Sun-Times Media)
Among the Obama policy detractors: JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon, who supported Obama's presidential bid but actively opposed his financial regulation overhaul. Not surprisingly, Dimon was not on the 400-strong guest list for the bill-signing.
White House aides dispute an antibusiness bias, noting that corporate profits are up 65 percent from two years ago. "The stakes are too high for us to be working against each other," top presidential advisers Rahm Emanuel and Valerie Jarrett wrote to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
Reaching out to big business, Obama named more than a dozen top CEOs to a presidential Export Council, revived a Bush administration free-trade pact with South Korea and stumped aggressively for cutting taxes and increasing loans for small businesses. But it is noticeable that not a single former corporate executive is in his Cabinet or among his top economic advisers.
Obama has nurtured "an increasingly hostile environment for investment and job creation," said Verizon CEO Ivan Seidenberg, chairman of the Business Roundtable. Thomas Donohue, who heads the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, sees a "cumulative job-killing impact of over-regulation" under Obama.
Of course, not all business leaders are negative and many have offered words of support.
UPS chief executive Scott Davis said Obama's goal of doubled exports in five years would help "foster engagement in the global economy for small and large businesses." Ford CEO Alan Mulally said Obama recognizes that "for exports to grow we must ensure that market access for manufactured goods remains at the center of U.S. trade policy."
Both Davis and Mulally are members of Obama's new export panel.
While Obama said small businesses will "lead this recovery," the National Small Business Association recently issued a report saying that more small businesses are unable to get financing than at any time over the past 17 years. Unless they can get the loans they need "we will continue to see high unemployment," NSBA President Todd McCracken said.
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