NOTE: This post is aimed at American small businesses. Read accordingly.
Small businesses are not bad when they’re oh, say, your aunt’s Etsy store that sells custom mail boxes. Or a dog walking business you and your friend run. But a small shop or employer? No way, too much of a risk the employer will be an absolute nightmare. Half the stories here lately are about how small business owners weaponize their small status to guilt employees into accepting low wages and poor to no benefits. I have too much experience with this myself to pretend like small businesses are an automatic good for the country or for labor anymore.
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Small businesses depress wages by offering less than larger employers, which makes larger employers match their wages downward, which lowers the bar for everyone.
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Small businesses don’t offer benefits and leech off of public programs by encouraging poverty to flourish to they can artificially keep their prices low.
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Small businesses prey on women in the service industry by offering things like “flexibility” which they need for taking care of kids and family, in exchange for taking a job which doesn’t offer a fair and reliable wage.
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Small businesses are full of entitled, whiny man children who would throw their own mother under a bus to save a quarter because they started a business BEFORE they learned money management and business skills. This also why most small businesses fail within the first five years.
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Small businesses dodge taxes and pay under the table to meet payroll even more so than larger employers, refuse to give their employees accurate W-2 information.
These are just a few examples. I’m not saying all small businesses suck, just that it’s a trend and too great a risk. I’d rather put up with the mundane toil, useless HR, and hatred for a larger employer than the aggressive personal dysfunction small businesses foster and thrive on in America.