President Barack Obama urged lawmakers Thursday to pass legislation to help small business get loans and create jobs.
After a meeting with bipartisan leaders of Congress, the president gave a run-down of the topics discussed and about the “busy agenda” going forward on the Hill. They discussed the continuing oil spill crisis in the Gulf of Mexico, the need to finish the financial regulatory bill, and the importance of completing a supplemental funding package to support U.S. troops in Afghanistan.
The president spoke of small businesses as the primary drivers of jobs, and how they are still having problems securing loans.
“We are still seeing problems for small businesses when it comes to being able to obtain loans to expand or hire new people or just maintain their inventories,” he said. “And so we’ve got a package of measures that have been worked on on a bipartisan basis that would help in terms of capitalizing small firms that would eliminate capital gains taxes for startups and small businesses. Those measures need to be put in place. We need to get that done, because the work of repairing this economy is not complete.”
He also said that he will continue to focus on an energy agenda that is forward-looking and creates jobs, but also recognizes that we will be reliant on fossil fuels for years to come. To help further his plans, Obama met with Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates and the former chairman of DuPont “who have come up with a series of recommendations about how we need to move much more aggressively on the energy agenda.”