400 Job Fairs in the Works to Hire Heroes

From the Political Affairs and Federation Department of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce

Less than a year after launching Hiring Our Heroes, as our way of stepping up to support the men and women who have given so much for our country, we’re ahead of schedule. We’ve hosted 85 hiring fairs and connecting more than 84,000 veterans and military spouses with 4,300 employers in 42 states and the District of Columbia. More than 7,300 have gotten jobs as a result of our program.
Still, veterans face an unemployment rate of 12%, more than a quarter above the national average, and 1-in-4 military spouses are without jobs. With the drawdown of the Army and Marine Corps looming, combined with these grim statistics, our work is just beginning. Hundreds of thousands of talented service members will be looking for private sector opportunities in the coming years.

That is why Hiring Our Heroes is scaling our efforts. In our second year, we will be hosting 400 hiring fairs across the country.

The 1099-K Mandate

Ken Lutes’s blog today on freeenterprise.com:

First, the Chamber killed the 1099 reporting mandate that was lurking in the health care reform law. Then, it slew the onerous 3% withholding tax that has been circling the business community for many years. And just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water (cue the dramatic music), the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) pushed forward another burden that threatens to take a bite out of small businesses’ scare resources.

The new onerous data collection and paperwork burdens being leveled against small businesses are known as the 1099-K mandate.

As reported in National Journal, the 1099-K mandate:

[R]equires businesses to reconcile reports from credit-card processors with actual gross sales on every credit and debit transaction. Businesses are already required to report the income they make from credit-card transactions, but under this new rule, credit-card companies will send out forms to businesses that require them to list the total number of their gross credit and debit sales. Business owners will then have to deduct any fees, income taxes, cash back, or non-income-related dollars from that gross number and report their net income to the IRS. The new rule affects everything from large chain stores to independent sellers, both online and in brick-and-mortar buildings.

The rub is that the IRS wasn’t even expressly given this authority by Congress.

The U.S. Chamber applauds Congressman Aaron Schock (R-IL) and Senator John Thune (R-SD) for introducing legislation to repeal the unnecessary and burdensome 1099-K mandate.  Stay tuned for more information on this troublesome issue and how you can call on Congress to take action.