By The Staff | The Save Jersey Blog
Governor Christie is pushing a massive cut in New Jersey’s unemployment insurance taxes on employers, Save Jerseyans, but Laurie Ehlbeck of the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB).
“Small businesses fighting for survival in New Jersey need all of the help they can get and continue to be grateful for Governor Christie’s willingness to advocate on their behalf,” explained Ehlbeck not long after Christie announced an increase to the July 1st unemployment insurance tax cut of $200 million by another $180 million, bringing the grand total tax cut to $380 million for N.J. employers as of July 1st. “Reducing the amount of unemployment tax that an employer must pay is a surefire way to empower a small business owner to expand their existing business or hire new people, when that happens, everyone wins but the Governor’s actions don’t take place in a vacuum.”
“While our members look forward to the largest unemployment tax reduction in modern New Jersey history on July 1st, unfortunately, they must also keep an eye on anti-business policies birthed in the legislature whose damage will pale in comparison to Governor Christie’s well-intended tax relief,” she continued. “We have a study demonstrating the harsh long-term reality for small businesses in New Jersey that will be released tomorrow, and while I wish it were different, the long game for our members in this state is questionable, at best.”
Ehlbeck recently laid out Trenton’s recent hostile actions against Garden State businesses in an op-ed published here at Save Jersey.
The Senate is expected to consider a $15 minimum wage hike on Thursday which would devastate N.J. small businesses.
Yesterday’s cut news was made possible by improved short-term solvency in the State’s Unemployment Insurance Trust Fund which now has a positive balance of approximately $1.8 billion:
“This is the largest unemployment insurance tax relief in New Jersey history, the single biggest unemployment tax cut for businesses in the modern history of the state. On average, New Jersey companies will pay nearly $100 less per employee in taxes. That is a tremendous benefit for everybody in this state because it will allow successful private sector companies, just like this one, New Jersey Manufacturers– not the government – to continue growing our economy and creating jobs,” Christie explained. “And I absolutely believe it is because of the policies that we have worked with in concert with the business community. When I was running for Governor in 2009, I didn’t feel the need to go and reinvent the wheel. I went to the business community and said what are the things that you have been begging for for the last 8 years? Tell me and we will try to get it done. And we did.
“$2.3 billion in tax reforms and reductions that are fully now phased in and we’re seeing the benefit of that across the state,” Christie added. “Our New Jersey Grow program and economic incentive programs that have been merged into one and are now being run by the Economic Development Authority in a way that really allows us to target not only to places in the state that we want to have business go with New Jersey Growth Zones, but also for the kind of industries and the kind of jobs we want to attract.“
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