Why should YOU care about NAWBO’s national political advocacy initiatives?
A message from J. Lenora Bresler
NAWBO Lakeland Metro
Federal laws, particularly tax laws, greatly impact your ability to be successful. With 5,000 members in 60 chapters, NAWBO, through its Advocacy division, headed by Joy Lutes, is the largest lobbying group for the nation’s 11.6 million women owned businesses. Some of the issues NAWBO currently advocates are:
- Less documentation to qualify for home office expense deductions
- Pushing for 100%, rather than current 50%, deductibility of meal and entertainment advertising expenses which are more likely done by women who are more likely to engage in one-on-one networking
- Elimination of the “double tax” of the estate or death tax as a deterrent to investment
- Full implementation of 10-year-old requirement (not yet met) that 5% of federal contracts go to women owned businesses
- Full deductibility of valid business expenses regardless of office location and business entity
- Opposition of federal agencies’ custom of “bundling” unrelated goods and services into one large contract, thereby placing small businesses at a disadvantage to compete against mega chains
The Advocacy toolkit on the NAWBO website www.nawbo.org includes a link to www.pewstate.org, where you can quickly scan daily political highlights from Washington and from any state in the nation. Additional resources under the Advocacy tab on NAWBO.org include easy links to federal and state officials and tracking pending legislation and committee hearings. In addition, any NAWBO member can attend live or access later the monthly, free one-hour webinars on public policy topics conducted by NAWBO. July’s program was about trends in state tax policy. NAWBO is also sponsoring on-going webinars explaining what member businesses need to do to comply with Obamacare (Affordable Health Care Act).
A successful business owner must be knowledgeable about the opportunities and threats presented by the political process. Be aware that www.NAWBO.org/advocacy makes it easy for you to stay knowledgeable and involved!