I love this Country. When I get the opportunity to speak on entrepreneurship and my experiences in business, I always make it a point to say that I love to pay taxes. Don’t get me wrong, I do everything within the bounds of the law to minimize my tax liability. However, the more taxes I am ultimately responsible for, the more money I made that year. In addition to that, this Country is the single greatest platform for entrepreneurship on the planet. Always has been and always will be. So, having said that………for some reason I remembered a particularly frustrating experience with some of our tax receiving government employee friends.
Let me just start out by saying this – what is up with government employees? Particularly any government employee that has to “inspect” anything. They are easily the most annoying. Case in point – I recall a restaurant franchise that I opened awhile back. The gal at the health department decided that even though we had built that store in an identical fashion to all of the other new ones in her county, we still have to go through a full 2-week plan review. That is fine, we turned the plans in about 10 days prior, so we thought that was enough time. I remember that we called to find out when the inspection would be prior to our opening in 10 days, only to find out that the 2-week plan review period was in “business days”. As I recall, the previous Monday was a government holiday, so that put us into the next week – but there was a kicker, hence the reason I remember this story. We had 35,000 coupons that announced our opening for this weekend. Do you think this mattered to whatever-her-name was? No. She was sticking to her guns and we didn’t get the store open until next week. Those coupons that dropped – well, lets just say they didn’t attain their maximum efficiency.
As I reflect on this, I recall what I thought then and still think now.
The government should force all of it’s employees who are involved with the development of new businesses (licensing, inspection, construction, public health, etc.) to actually work in a real job at a for-profit organization for at least 6 months prior to beginning their employment with the Government. These people have no idea what it is like to actually have a financial consequence as a result of their cavalier and often obtuse reactions to the requests of business owners. This person at the health department, whom I called when our contractor couldn’t get anywhere with them, told me flat out that she “didn’t really care – it was our problem”. I wish there was an opportunity for these government employees to have this type of treatment pushed upon them. “Sorry, you can’t move into your new home because we haven’t had 30 days to inspect the plumbing yet. 30 days will be on Monday, so why don’t you stay at a hotel for the next 3 days while we wait until Monday. Sorry, not our problem”. This doesn’t happen though – a for profit contractor would never say this to their client!
So why does the government not treat us like a customer? I pay my taxes – happily as I mentioned earlier. My business will only add to their tax base and it will provide jobs as well. Shouldn’t their attitude be “how can we help you” not “how can we hinder you”? This is what it all comes down to:
If they didn’t hold up projects, cause delays for inspections, make you re-build or re-do plans, file applications, pay fees and have long waits for all of the above, they would be out of a job. That is what the bottom line is – government employees, for the most part (of course there are exceptions), should have somewhere in their job description the words “justifying your existence”, because I am convinced that is part of the duties they fulfill.
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Amen!
Amen. I love the fact that the gov’t has a Staples ‘Easy’ Button, except, unlike small businesses, it’s an ‘Increase Revenue’ Button and it’s result is raising taxes. The fact that the City of Chicago has to shut down its non-essential gov’t services b/c it can’t run a balanced budget is unreal. Trim the fat, find more efficient ways to do things, pretend the public is your customer, be nice, be courteous, get off that high horse. If the gov’t were a business it would have been bankrupt long ago (wait, we kinda are)…
First of all, I have to agree that governments can be a pain in the butt. Most of the employees, however, don’t know the laws they are trying to enforce – only what they have been told about the laws they enforce and what they have been trained to do. I have had to go up against one or two government agencies and their “requests”. Having a bit of knowledge of the law on my side, I was able to put the agency down and make my issue come through as it should. That being said, it seems to me that what is irritating you here is not that the employees are trying to stall your opening, but that you had full knowledge of what they were going to ask for, thought you could skate by and didn’t. Like it or not, they did their job. By turning your plans in late and hoping for an exception, you were set up for a denial before you even started. Had you turned your plans in on time, they would have done their job and you would have opened on time.
I teach all my franchisees to know the law and know what is expected before hand. Add some time to that so you don’t get caught short and have time to correct any problem that might pop up.
As for this county being the best base for entrepreneurship, I would hae to disagree. There are many countries where ordinary people are able to open road side shops or stall in markets. Try doing that in the US and you will be stopped for not having a permit, a health inspection, a tax number, an employee number a sales tax permit and any number of other things. In those countries, which I frequent often, they simply set out their goods and sell them. I have seen markets with literally hundreds and hundreds of stalls and no government interference. Our problem is that we make having a business here a difficult effort and then wonder why the economy sucks like it does. I is the govenment that is asking us to justify our existence instead of the other way around.
Hi Marc,
Thanks for the comment. I am glad when you have had to go up against the government, your issues worked out in your favor. That is great! You are the exception I believe, not the rule. I do need to clarify something though – my plans were not turned in late. We had built the identical restaurant in this same county before. We turned them in 10 days before the due date, which is what they said was the timeline necessary. They did not say 10 business days, nor did they discount for any holidays. We submitted within the rules – more importantly, we had submitted identical plans before – a very easy approval. My point was, had they been a good business, they would have done what they could to make things easier for me, not harder – or I could potentially take my business elsewhere. However, they know and I know that there is nowhere else to “take my business”. They have a monopoly.
As for this Country being the best base for entrepreneurship, I do agree that many countries around the world make it easy to set up a cart and sell product. But we are talking entrepreneurship here Marc – creating jobs, driving revenue, and creating new niches – not selling cucumbers. While I in now way want to downplay the importance of these small business owners, they do not do any of the above. I would rather have a bunch of over regulated storefronts, service businesses, technology companies and energy moguls then 100’s of carts in a line selling homemade wares. As difficult as our current economic situation is, I wouldn’t change living in the USA as an entrepreneur for any country in the world. Those that think there are better opportunities to be an entrepreneur elsewhere should go there – nothing is stopping them (not saying this is you by the way).
Generally speaking, there are two kinds of people in life – those that complain and do something about it, and those that complain and then complain some more, and continue to do nothing or little about it. I hope to be one that complains – like I did in this blog – but do something about it.
Thanks for your comment again Marc – I hope you respect my ability to disagree, and vice versa. That is what this blog is
for – commentary and often times disagreement and discussion.
-Alex
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