Archive for November 19th, 2008
November 19th, 2008
I recently made contact with the State of Illinois Office of Trade and Investment to see if they could assist me in finding distributors in Canada. Anyone thinking of this as a market, should read further.
After an earlier e-mail exchange with the Chicago office, I received a telephone call from two IL/Canada representatives, one of whom is a former Rockfordian, Jeffrey Johnson. He attended West H.S. and moved to Canada in 1990.
We had a very good discussion about their process whereby they research the possibilities, conduct telephone interviews, then arrange for a visit to Canada for face-face meetings. This should occur after January 1st.
I was impressed with the service I received from this office and I look forward to developing this market.
A good use of our taxpayer dollars!
November 19th, 2008
At the invitation of the Rockford Area Economic Development Corporation (Mark Podemski and Marie-Louise Pettersson), I took advantage of meeting with them and Leif Eriksson from the Sweden Export Sales company called ITM. Marie-Louise is an intern from Sweden working with RAEDC and helped to organize maybe 10 companies for Mr. Eriksson to visit. Mr. Eriksson is the Director, Industrial Development of the City of Lidkoping, Sweden.
An interesting concept that Sweden has developed. Thanks to Mark who saw this as an opportunity for local area manufacturers to enter Sweden/Europe by training a Sweden sales representative to sell their products in Sweden and other parts of Europe.
The program works by a local company agreeing to hire on a pre-screened young person from Sweden to work and train in his/her company for 6 months. There would also be a training program on various sales modules that would include International Trade Strategies, International Market Research,International Law and several others over an 11 day period, most of which would be back in Sweden.
At the end of the 6 months, the trainee returns to Sweden to a facility that acts like an incubator and for low facility costs, the newly trained sales representative begins selling for the Rockford company as their employee.
It looks like a good way for a company to begin the journey of exporting into Sweden/Europe.
If you’d like more information, contact Marie-Louise at mlpettersson@rockfordil.com or 815-987-8118. Better hurry, she retuns to Sweden in February!
November 19th, 2008
Congressman Don Manzullo today proposed several new strategies Congress can pursue to ease America’s credit crunch, strengthen our economy and create jobs without sticking taxpayers with the bill. Manzullo offered his suggestions during a Financial Services Committee hearing called to discuss the state of the U.S. economy.
Manzullo, who opposed the $700 billion taxpayer bailout of Wall Street in favor of several proven free-market alternatives, said one strategy — accelerating the domestic manufacturing tax deduction — would give our companies a cash infusion they could use to sustain and create new jobs in America.
The American Jobs Creation and Economic Stimulus Act of 2008 (HR 5101), which Manzullo authored with Rep. Dan Lipinski (D-IL) earlier this year, would speed up the domestic manufacturing tax deduction to give manufacturers a larger tax break on the goods they produce in the United States. The tax deduction – which Manzullo helped create in 2004 – currently provides a 6 percent tax rate reduction for manufacturers on the goods and services they produce in the United States. The tax rate reduction is scheduled to increase to 9 percent by 2010, but the bill would accelerate the phase-in to 9 percent retroactively to Jan. 1, 2008.
“This legislation gives our manufacturers an extra 3 percent cut in their tax rate immediately that they can use to sustain and create jobs in America,” Manzullo said. “It also provides a greater incentive for our manufacturers to keep jobs in the United States and actually bring some jobs back from overseas because they would pay a 9 percent tax premium on any work they send offshore.”
Manzullo supports several other free-market strategies to strengthen our economy, including:
- Allowing companies to repatriate their overseas profits back to the United States tax free for one year if the money is used to pay off distressed debt or support business expansion or job creation.
- Suspending the capital gains and recapture taxes for two years to encourage Americans to invest in America and encourage corporations to sell unwanted assets and acquire the capital they need to sustain and create jobs.
- Allowing companies to carry-back losses an additional two years, generating a tax refund and immediate capital.
- Directing the Securities and Exchange Commission to suspend the mark-to-market regulatory rules until the agency can issue new guidelines that will allow firms to mark these assets to their true economic value.
- Reducing the corporate tax rate from 35 to 15 percent.
