I would like to thank WIPP’s Presidents Barbara Kasoff for their work too, Barbara there you are. Thank you so much.
You know my dear friend Congresswoman Allen Tasher is here, Allen is a leader on so many issues in the congress on. I’m thrilled that she’s here to be part of this celebration. I want to take the sponsors because they really understood while this is important. American Express, Fed Ex, Jet Loose, CISCO Systems, Marriott and of course AIG with this incredible gift that is possible for even more women to find success in business.
So let’s give a round of applause to all of this. Thank you, thank you. I want someone to come up here and stand with me; I hope I don’t embarrass her but Natalie Walker. Natalie is from Nevanya New York, she runs the business for our Network Industrial Tire. She has worked incredibly hard to rebuild her business after she and her husband were in the terrible car accident. She has to take over for her husband even if she is straggling to recover herself.
Her 17-year-old Son pitched in after school and in weekends and I know how great full you were for his help. Now, heard about Donalie and Family in fact she heard about them and an advance that I held in Geneseo, New York to create the Finger Lakes trading go up. Now heard that Natalie’s business with struggling to get an absolutely essential immediate loan, well Natalie got a count me in micro loan and she receive counselling to help improve her business performance. Not only did she pay off the loan early, not only that she manage to grow her business despite all she and her family had gone through. She is now applying for the Make Mine a Million Dollar Business Program.
I’m giving her track record I think we can expect great things, she is a inspiration and a living example of what we can do, with women are given the tools to succeed. We’ve seen this all over the world. Now mentioned that when we we’re together in Beijing and at Cairo at the NGO conference and our whole point was unleashed the potential of women. Here at home and around the world, give women the tools to make responsible decisions for them selves and there families and just watch what happens and that’s why I was proud to join count me in to launch The Make Mine a Million Dollar Business in March of last year. To provide women business owners with the tools, the advice and the confidence to kind of pull up their business into the next level of success.
Now some of you know that I just announce my Health Care plan yesterday the American help choices plan. And one of the decision that I made base on all the work that I’ve done all the stars that I applied, everything that has happened there on the last 15 years is that I wanted to have a plan that provided Health Care choices to Americans that respected and recognize the important essential role that small business placed In our economy. 80% of all jobs created in America in the last 15 years have come from small business. And that’s why in my plan what I want to do is to help small business to see whether they can afford Health Care not to man dated but to offer them a Health Care tax credit that would enable them to look at their books and figure out whether Health Care is affordable. And by opening up the congressional plan and all the choices that are in that then small business are no longer on their own being taking advantage of in the small business market for Health Insurance. All of the sudden you’re part of a big national group and there for the price come down. So between the price coming down and the choices available and the Health Care Text Credit we might be able to move up the percentage of small business that can afford it.
And I’m excited about that, so it’s a real way to recognize the essential role that small business are playing, and then if you add the fact that close to half of all business in the US or own by women. But less in 3% percent of them have 1 million or more annual revenues. We could close this gap, create more employment at a time when our economy desperately needs more employment and create millions of new jobs that will get as over this barrier that we’re not creating jobs. We lost 4000 jobs in our economy last month, we’re not seeing the job creation but the place we will see it is in the small business factory if we support this.
So here is the goal, One million women to reach one million and revenue by 2010, we know it’s not going to happen over night, nothing important ever does. But we are putting all the building blocks in place. You got the people who really support this idea behind you, you’ve got this extra ordinary sponsors and especially AIG with the capital available, and I think that we could see real progress to hit that goal by 2010.
Now obviously I hope we can celebrate hitting that goal with the white house. Well that’s good, but what I’m excited about is the energy and the dynamism that all of you represent. Yes, you’re going to make your own lives better. You’re surely going to make your family’s wife better; some of you have come from incredible odds. You know I told one story with Natalie, I could probably tell a dozen or more stories, a people over coming so much that would have just broken the spirit of another person. But you have persevered, I really respect that. I think you get up everyday; you do the best you can. Life is not a dress rehearsal, and you take what ever opportunities come your way and then you try to create some more, and I am so proud to be your partner in this effort and I look forward to celebrating One million that had made a million by 2010 with you. Thank you all very much.
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