The best way to support dreams and stretch is to set apart small ideas with big potential, then give people positive role models and the resources to turn small projects into big businesses.
Positive thinking is just one small part of positive psychology. Plus, as an approach to well-being, positive thinking only helps you to the extent that it yields one or more positive emotions. The problem with positive thinking is that it sometimes just stays up "in the head" and fails to drip down to become a fully embodied experience.
Small businesses pay 18 percent more than big businesses for health care, the same health care, just because they're small and they have too small a pool of risk.
So what is the difference between "power thinking" and "positive" thinking? The distinction is slight but profound. To me, people use positive thinking to pretend that everything is rosy, when they really believe that it's not. With power thinking, we understand that everything is neutral, that nothing has meaning except for the meaning we give it, and that we are going to make up a story and give something it's meaning.
Big businesses have always had a lot more voice. They can afford advertising; they can afford marketing. But for small businesses, being able to quickly and cheaply connect to customers is a big deal.
Somewhere along the line, positive thinking seems to have been confused with magical thinking. There's a notion that if you think positively enough, you can make anything happen by using the power of your mind. All the positive thinking in the world won't deliver good fortune or prevent tragedy from striking.
We must never forget that it is the private sector - not government - that is the engine of economic opportunity. Businesses, particularly small businesses, flourish and can provide good jobs when government acts as a productive partner.
Big businesses can help by engaging aspiring entrepreneurs and promoting initiatives which support small businesses from within.
Small businesses already struggle to compete with big businesses that enjoy the luxury of a tax code filled with corporate loopholes.
Many small businesses rely on small financial institutions, like credit unions and community banks, to meet their capital requirements. Without them, these small businesses would have to close their doors.
I don't understand small businesses, only big ones. Marriage is the hardest small business.
If you talk to anyone involved in business - forget banks and big business - talk to small businesses - do it yourself, don't ask me - they'll tell you it's crippling. Small-business formation is the lowest it has ever been in a recovery, and it's really for two reasons. One is regulations and the second is access to capital for people starting new businesses.
And what's interesting, and I don't think a lot of Americans understand this fact, is that, one, most new jobs are created by small businesses; two, most small businesses pay tax at the individual income tax, or many small businesses pay tax there.
Oh, I'm all about small business. I think what we've learned from big business and big Wall Street is that unchecked greed and the creation of false value gets us all in trouble. If we look at the American economy, who's really creating value? It's the small businesses.
There ain't no clean way to make a hundred million bucks.... Somewhere along the line guys got pushed to the wall, nice little businesses got the ground cut out from under them... Decent people lost their jobs.... Big money is big power and big power gets used wrong. It's the system.
We owe it to American taxpayers to make sure that contracts intended for small businesses go to small businesses.