Posted on 05/04/2009 5:05:34 PM PDT by mgist
**** ***** is a ***** Commissioner and also the owner of "**** *****", a large Cigar Company located here in Miami and in Nicaragua.
To All My Treasured Employees,
There has been talk around the office and comments from a questionnaire that we sent out to all of you about the future of our company and about your jobs. As you well know, the economy is getting worse and thanks to your new President signing off on Schip it will present even more challenges. However, the good news is this: The economy doesn't pose a threat to your job. What does pose a threat to your job however, is the changing landscape in this country which is starting to mirror socialist countries in the European Union.
However, let me tell you some little tidbits of fact which might help you decide what is in your best interest.
First, while it is easy to spew rhetoric that cast employers against employees, you have to understand that for every business owner there is a back-story. This back-story is so often neglected and overshadowed by what you see and hear. Sure, you see me park my Mercedes outside. You have even seen my home at our many get together’s. I am sure all these flashy icons of luxury conjure up some idealized thoughts about my life. However, what you don't see is the true back-story.
I started this company some 15 years ago. At that time I lived in a 1,000 square foot home in which my entire living room and small garage were converted into an office and a packaging room so I could put forth 100% effort into building a company, which by the way would eventually employ you.
My diet consisted of Ramen Pride noodles and the free food my dear wife would bring home after a hard night waitressing to help us make a living. Also my second job was a big help. I gotta tell you the 18 hour days were tough. The little sleep I got was a luxury. We drove an old Nissan and Toyota Corolla that had a real bad window and a defective transmission. We didn't have many date nights. Often times I stayed in on weekends and of course worked even more! While my friends went out drinking, and partying, I was not only married to Janine, but also to my business--hard work, tireless hours, little sleep, discipline and a whole lot of sacrifice and pressure.
Meanwhile my friends got their jobs. They worked 40 hours a week, versus my 90 to 100 hours a week.They made a modest income, and spent every dime they earned. They drove nice cars and lived in nice homes, and wore fancy clothes. Instead of hitting Nordstrom's for the latest fashion items, I was trolling through Marshalls extracting any clothing item that didn't look like it was birthed in the 70's. My friends refinanced their mortgages and lived a real good life. I, however, did not. I put in my time, my money and my complete life into a business that eventually, I hoped would allow me to afford these luxuries my friends supposedly had. So while some of you physically arrive at the office at 8 am, mentally check in at noon then leave at 6 PM sharp .I don't. You see there is no "off" button for me. When some of you leave the office, you are done and many of you have the weekend all to yourselves. I unfortunately do not have that freedom. I eat and breathe this company every minute on the day. There is still not much rest. There are really no weekends. There is no happy hour. You see every day this business is attached to my hip like a special-needs child. You, of course, only see the fruits of that garden- the nice house, the Mercedes, the vacation. You never realize the true back-story and the deep sacrifices that I have made.
Now, the economy is falling apart and I am getting whacked by huge taxes. My biggest competition is now the United States Government. And I, the person that made all of the right decisions and saved all of his pennies, now has to bailout all of the people who didn't. The people that overspent their paychecks suddenly feel entitled to the very same luxuries that I EARNED and SACRIFICED over a decade of my life for.
Yes, business ownership has its benefits, but the price I've paid is very steep and not without wounds.
Unfortunately, the cost of running this business, and employing you, is starting to eclipse the threshold of the marginal benefit and let me explain to you why:
I am being taxed to death and the government thinks I don't pay enough. I have State taxes, Federal Taxes, outrageous Tobacco taxes, A.T.F. taxes, Property taxes, Payroll taxes, Workers compensation taxes, Unemployment taxes and Taxes on taxes. I even have to hire a Tax attorney and accounting firm to manage all of these taxes and then guess what? I have to pay taxes for employing him. Government mandates and regulations and all the accounting that goes with it now occupies most of my time. This past month I wrote a check for over a quarter of a million dollars for quarterly taxes. Basically most of my profits went to the federal government. You know what my stimulus check was? Of course Zero, Nada, Zilch.
The question I have is this: Who is stimulating the economy? Me, the person who has provided over 3,000 people good paying jobs, and serves thousands more with a flourishing business? Or the single mother sitting at home pregnant with her fifth kid out of wedlock waiting for her next welfare check? The very same check that her mother and grandmother have been receiving for years. Obviously this new government and so called President feels the latter is the economic stimulus of this country. So I guess that I am the 5% that this moron said are the only ones that are supposedly going to be getting another tax increase!
The fact is if I deducted (Stole) 50% of your paycheck, you would quit and you wouldn't work here. I mean why would you? That's nuts. Who wants to get rewarded only 50% of their hard work? Well' I agree which is why your job is in jeopardy.
Here is what many of you don't understand- to truly stimulate our economy you need to stimulate what runs our economy. Had suddenly the government mandated to me that I didn't need to pay taxes, guess what? Instead of depositing that $250,000 into the Washington black hole and trusting Obama with my hard earned money in which he has never ever run or had a business in his life, hence his stupid socialist idea of a stimulus package that will never work. Folks I would have spent the $250,000, hired more employees, expanded my business and would have generated economic growth. My employees would have enjoyed the wealth of that tax cut in the form of promotions and better salaries. We would truly stimulate this economy. But you can forget it now.
When you have a comatose man on the verge of death, you don't defibrillate and shock his thumb and think that will bring him back to life, do you? Or, do you defibrillate his heart? Business is at the heart of America and always has been. To restart it, you must stimulate it, not kill it. Suddenly, the power brokers in Washington believe the poor of America are the essential drivers of the American economic engine. Nothing can be further from the truth and this is the type of change you can keep.
So where is **** going with all of this?
It's quite simple.
If any more new taxes are levied on me, or my company, my reaction will be swift and simple. I fire you, I fire your co-workers. You can then plead with the Government to pay your rent, your SUV, and your child's future. Frankly, it isn't my problem anymore. Then I will close this company down, move to another country, and retire. You see, I'm done.I'm done with a country that penalizes the productive and gives it to the unproductive. My motivation to work and to provide jobs will be destroyed, and with it, will be my citizenship.
If you lose your job, it won't be at the hands of the economy: it will be at the hands of a left winged political hurricane that swept through this country, steam rolled the constitution and unfortunately will have changed its landscape forever. If that happens, you can find me on a beach, retired, and with no employees to worry about.
Sincerely,
****
Has someone “snoped” this thing?? I get a lot of emails of this nature forwarded to me, and I never know what is BS and what isn’t.
Snopes is leftie Crapola
The person who sent this email is a well known and prominent local business figure. I know this business and individual. I see that you are new here and may not realize that we don’t use a California couples website as our guiding light. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snopes
My guess is “Atlas” Cigar Co.
There are many many people who could write a letter like this. I shut down my business and work by myself now.
I am not the only one.
WRONG! Does it really matter what business it is? The point is, why would smart people sacrifice so much, if they are going to be punished for it? They won’t, I will not, and neither will any of you. Those of us with any money to spare will leave this country, and live comfortably somewhere else, without even having to work. Socialism stinks, especially for the middle class. They have no alternatives, and everything left goes to “the poor”.
What kind of a letter is that, I've never received one......It was the title of the thread.
The follow-up letter is going to ask you for your name, address and account numbers and tell you that you’ve won a bunch of cigars.....Just ignore it, smoking is bad for your health.
Forever you ask? Yes forever. It was hard starting a business 30 years ago, now with even more regulations, licenses, insurance fees and countless other hoops to jump through before opening the doors, it's near impossible for anyone to open up a new business venture. 95% of new businesses fail in the first year.
Oh but I'm sure Obama will figure out how to grant new ventures the money to loose. He'll just tax those that are barely hanging on more to pay for them.
If this guy is making real products or providing real services then he is well within his rights to complain.
However, if his business is speculation (e.g AIG, Citicorp, Goldman-Sachs, hedge fund manager, etc.) then he is getting what he deserves.
He who lives by the speculative bubble will die by the speculative crash and the bogus government interference that necessarily follows.
If that happens, you can find me on a beach, retired, and with no employees to worry about.
As a matter of fact, it doesn’t matter what kind of business this guy has. He has explained his position and his frustrations to his employees and given them fair warning that he is just about fed up, and the government’s long arms are reaching deeper into his pockets, so he’s at the tipping point. He’s on the brink of shutting down and checking out. Expect a lot more “Atlases” to “Shrug” in the coming months. Who could blame them?
Then he's plagiarizing like hell. Check out Google. The letter is all over the place.
It says he is a cigar maker at the very top of his article
This is someone in the manufacturing and distribution business in South Florida. Small businesses are vulnerable to taxation, and heavy regulation. Snall businesses happen to be the biggest employers. Sorry for the typo in the title, I'm multi-tasking.
He who lives by the speculative bubble will die by the speculative crash and the bogus government interference that necessarily follows.
And you deserve to suffer the consequences with thinking like that.
Obviously you haven't a clue how the markets work, what AIG and companies like them do, the importance of banks, investment companies are to this economy.
The problem is the crooks who get away with scamming through these institutions, not the institutions themselves.
These same crooks are now running the country, and you think they are "punishing" themselves and their pals?
If the CEO and Board get away with it because they are connected and they got golden parachutes, then that is only because the shareholders were not acting in their best interests when they chose those people to run the business and when they negotiated the terms of employment.
If the entire system is set up so that scumbags will necessarily rise to the top and shareholders will be forced to give them lucrative contracts in order to prevent other companies from stealing these scumbags away from them, then there is something inherently wrong with capitalism.
My own feeling is that slight adjustments can be made to a completely free market system to make it more difficult for scumbags to run companies for their own purposes rather than for the good of the shareholder. But I am not going to hold my breath for these minor changes to occur.
As you point out the scumbags who rise to the top of the business world have scumbag friends who rise to the top of the government to help them keep their ill-gotten gains.
The letter might not be real, but the effect likely is...
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.