奥巴马关于小企业救助计划的演讲

新华网华盛顿３月１６日电（记者 刘洪 胡芳）美国政府１６日公布一项计划，旨在通过采取一系列促进信贷等措施，帮助美国小企业走出目前的困境。根据这项计划，美国政府从７８７０亿美元经济刺激方案中划出７．３亿美元，用于降低小企业借贷成本，并将受小企业管理局贷款项目覆盖的所有贷款的担保比例提高至９０％。政府还将斥资１５０亿美元，解冻二级信贷市场；同时，政府还将要求接受政府救助的２１家美国大银行，每月报告给予小企业的信贷金额，以此促进金融企业向小企业提供更多信贷。

美国总统奥巴马当天表示，尽管许多小企业仍保持盈利，但信贷市场的停滞正使这些企业面临困境，政府此举则是促进小企业发展的第一步。

美国财政部当天也表示，美国新增就业岗位的７０％来自于小企业，美国政府将继续采取积极措施，确保小企业在美国经济复苏中发挥重大推动作用。

演讲全文：

Thank you very much.  First of all, Marco, thank you for the wonderful introduction.  I don’t know if people heard properly here, but this is a all-natural health food restaurant in Philly.  (Laughter.)  So I asked him what was the equivalent at his shop for a cheese steak.  (Laughter.)  And he described for me — what was it, a chicken –

MR. LENTINI:  It’s our Chicken Italiano.  (Laughter.)  It’s a chicken cutlet, spinach Florentine, sharp provolone, all on an Italian ciabatta bread.  (Laughter.)

THE PRESIDENT:  Right.  So I wanted to know if there was Whiz on that.  (Laughter.)  And he said, no.  (Laughter.)

Marco is an example of what small business is all about.  And I think Cynthia is an example of what community banks are doing all across the country, partnering with small businesses in order to create jobs and opportunity and entrepreneurship that’s been the driving force in our economy for so very long.

So I thank all of you, particularly the small businesses and community bankers who are here today.  And I thank the two of you, as well as some of the other entrepreneurs that we met, and bankers that we met, before this public event.  Thank you for sharing your stories.

I also want to thank the Chair and Ranking Member of the Senate Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship, Senators Mary Landrieu and Olympia Snowe.  Please give them a big round of applause.  (Applause.)  As well as the Chair and Ranking Member of the House Committee on Small Business, Congresswoman Nydia Velazquez and Congressman Sam Graves, who are here as well.  (Applause.)  I want to thank them publicly for being here, but also so much of the good work that our proposals today are building on has to do with the vigilance that they’ve shown on their committees.  So we very much appreciate that.

Now before I talk about the new steps we’re taking to get credit flowing to small businesses across our country, I do want to comment on the news about executive bonuses at AIG.  I think some of you have heard a little bit about this over the last few days.  This is a corporation that finds itself in financial distress due to recklessness and greed.  Under these circumstances, it’s hard to understand how derivative traders at AIG warranted any bonuses, much less $165 million in extra pay.  I mean, how do they justify this outrage to the taxpayers who are keeping the company afloat?

In the last six months, AIG has received substantial sums from the U.S. Treasury.  And I’ve asked Secretary Geithner to use that leverage and pursue every single legal avenue to block these bonuses and make the American taxpayers whole.  (Applause.)  I want everybody to be clear that Secretary Geithner has been on the case.  He’s working to resolve this matter with the new CEO, Edward Liddy — who, by the way, everybody needs to understand came on board after the contracts that led to these bonuses were agreed to last year.

But I think Mr. Liddy and certainly everybody involved needs to understand this is not just a matter of dollars and cents.  It’s about our fundamental values.  All across the country, there are people who are working hard and meeting their responsibilities every day, without the benefit of government bailouts or multi-million dollar bonuses.  You’ve got a bunch of small business people here who are struggling just to keep their credit line open — that they are foregoing pay, as one of our entrepreneurs talked about, they are in some cases mortgaging their homes, and doing a whole host of things just in order to keep things afloat.  All they ask is that everyone, from Main Street to Wall Street to Washington, play by the same rules.  And that is an ethic that we have to demand.

And what this situation also underscores is the need for overall financial regulatory reform, so we don’t find ourselves in this position again, and for some form of resolution mechanism in dealing with troubled financial institutions, so that we’ve got greater authority to protect American taxpayers and our financial system in cases such as this.

Now, we already have resolution authority — excuse me, I’m choked up with anger here — (laughter) — we always — already have some of that resolution authority when it comes to a traditional bank.  But when you start getting into AIGs and some of these other operations that have a whole bunch of different financial instruments, then we don’t have all the regulatory power that we need.  And this is something that I expect to work with Congress to deal with in the weeks and months to come.

Well, we’re here today to talk about how my administration can help the millions of small businesses bearing the brunt of this credit crisis.  And Secretary Geithner and I just met with not only Marco and Cynthia, but a number of other small business owners and community lenders who shared with us experiences that are familiar to so many.

Small businesses are the heart of the American economy.  They’re responsible for half of all private sector jobs –- and they create roughly 70 percent of all new jobs in the past decade.  So small businesses are not only job generators, they’re also at the heart of the American Dream.  After all, these are businesses born in family meetings around kitchen tables.  They’re born when a worker takes a chance on her desire to be her own boss.  They’re born when a part-time inventor becomes a full-time entrepreneur, or when somebody sees a product that could be better or a service that could be smarter, and they think, “Well, why not me?  Let me try it.  Let me take my shot.”  That’s Marco’s story, which he just shared with us.

That’s Brian Conrad’s story.  When Brian’s company eliminated his department — Brian is sitting right there, so I don’t want to embarrass him here, but it’s a great story — he lost his job, but he found his calling and started, you know, doing all kinds of work on a restaurant called the Blue Monkey, which now employs some 40 people in Pennsylvania’s Lehigh Valley.

That’s Carmen Jones’s story.  Carmen is over there.  Carmen was disabled in an accident a few years ago.  And in facing personal trials, she discovered a reservoir of strength and an untapped market.  So today she helps companies advertise and sell their services to people living with disabilities.

This is America’s story –- a place where we believe all things are possible; where we are limited only by our willingness to take a chance and work hard to achieve our dreams.