mentality mentality that took over and we are trained to ask other passengers to help us contain any problems if we are not able to easily diss escalate the problem when there are so many people acting out we did not have the training or the resources to deal with us on our planes and everyone was at risk. >> you can see the entire house transportation and for structure committee hearing tonight starting at 8:00 p.m. eastern here on c-span2. your testimony on protecting transportation industry workers and passengers from covid-19. >> the president and ceo of the job creators networks, good morning to you, thanks for joining us tell us about your organization. could you explain what it is and how it's funded and the perspective you take particularly when it comes to small businesses. >> guest: yes, absolutely. we represent 30 billion small business owners that really employs 60 million hard-working americans or that was pre- covid

of course and pre- lockdown. it is from all industries and from all different demographics in all different political preferences and it's just about small businesses in the backbone of our country and the backbone of our community and right now they are suffering and that is the biggest concern, especially as we talk about the $15 hour minimum wage and its handing in anger to a drowning man. this is the absolute worst time to have these discussions and even if we look at bernie sanders plan of a five-year rollout in june 2021 which is part of his plan goes from $7.25 which is a 305% increase and are five small businesses are already dying. look at what happened in newpp york city in california and they are barely surviving and we are on the brink of seeing a massive collapse of our small business community and our industry and that will not help our economy. >> host: but what ishe the currt aspect of the economy for those who make minimum wage what would you say to those people making

that wage currently at $7.50? [inaudible conversations] >> guest: those who lost their jobs with the keystone pipeline cancellation, these things can be fixed. when you look at the actual problem of $15 for entry-level positions those are never intended to be the wages for those types of positions for those positions are for the youth. for example, for those folks who are in those positions that have been there for a while we need to talk about a broader education or skill system for these folks. i can guarantee you when you look at germany they've done a outerm in his job of apprenticeships and we need to look at ways that we can actually help them through skill training to increase their output and increase with their actual worth is prayed that the biggest problem here is that we arear trying to fix this problem with the completely wrong solution. we have to give them the skills get to earn greater wages and if

you mandate that 15 minimum dollar wage, guess what, technology will take over and the ceo said 2.7 million jobs are at risk at a 15 dollar an hour wage. i read to that report and they glazed over the technology issue but i can guarantee you that when technology coming down in the wage increase we are talking about that inflection point we will hit and you will see technology take over these entry-level jobs. >> host: there was a comment from an economist at the policy institute who talked about the cbo and the minimum wage increase and he said when it comes to looking at those numbers that you reference what happens is that yes, it is true thatis when you raise the minimm wage employers hire fewer low-wage workers and that is correct but on the other hand the factor that is offsetting is that even though employers are hiring fewer workers fewer workers are leaving their jobs so how do you respond that? >> guest: when you look at where we are in the economy we are still $10 million million jobs short of 2020 and that includes

over 4 million people that have actually left the labor force oland a lot of those are out of jobs are now are women and they have been hit actually hard, especially because of the school shutdowns. again from an economy standpoint this is not a one-size-fits-all solution and byta the way, withn the covid relief bill the 1.9 trillion bill being tdiscussed there is a very powerful and great idea that we do support which is enhancing and expanding the earned income tax credit. it's wonky i think that's why americans don't use it but we called the working americans credit because we see that that's a fantastic way to address those lower wage earners without sacrificing our small businesses. >> host: we have another perspective to share with you. this is from house budget committee chair who talks about the biden relief plan efforts to pass it and how it would extend economic recovery and that low interest rates would also enclose for and we will get the thoughts and perspective on it.

>> past crises have made it clear that doing too little will cost us far more and we support will lead to a k shaped recovery pulling more severe risk to our economic and budget outlooks than any deficits we might incur. without the american risk cbo estimates it will take at least three years before employment turns to pre- pandemic levels but with this vital support economists estimate that we can bring the economy back to near full employment in a little over 12 months. we have the plan and the ability to do this and thankfully we can walso afford to do it. interest rates and inflation are at historic lows and more today than ever before the pandemic and the return on smart investments in the economy has never been higher. economists of all stripes are telling us, begging us to use the fiscal space we have and they are warning that we don't go big we will be responsible

for a long and painful and unequal recovery. >> host: mr. ortiz, what would be your reaction to that? >> it's always easy to spend other peoples money. if you look at the latest bill would be a total of $6 trillion, 150% basedon on the gdp output d i think that's plenty of spending and my understanding is it'se a chilean dollars that haven't been spent from the last relief bill. we need to be smart about this and there is something called inflation and i know the democrats are pushing this modern monetary theory which i know janet ellen supports and no surprise she's our treasury secretary but it's basically this idea that because of low interest rates you can basically borrow unlimited levels and that's what happened with socialist countries like venezuela and that could happen to us if we keep on using debt spending to finance every single socialist with list agenda item. >> host: efforts of small business with the biden administration and power with our guest of frito ortiz and you can call and ask questions,

(202)748-8001 republik and, (202)748-8000, democrats and independents, (202)748-8002 and if you're a small business owner, (202)748-8003, isaac and independents you are on with our guest. go ahead. >> caller: thank you for taking my call. i realize that when i was listening to the callers i understand why we were trying to do this in the first place dealing with but just to be clear are we still talking about the impeachment trial? >> host: we moved to a new topic. >> caller: okay, let me go ahead and let another call or come in because i was: about the impeachment trials we want but we will pick it up in the last half-hour so if you want to give us a call back then and try to do so, feels free. michigan, democrat line, go

ahead. >> caller: yes, good morning. as far as i agree that people can't live in the minimum wage but it's like corporate welfare because people making that have to rely on the social safety net, government, food stamps et cetera so one way or the other the public taxpayers are picking up the slack and technology will take over regardless and that is the minimum wage is going to affect that and technology will continue but it will cause inflation but we are already seeing that in the way the stock market is inflated and as crazy as it may seem the fed has said that is one of their goals is inflation which is meant to hurt everybody in the long run and

you already see it in the record highs every day in the stock market. you've done a great job making the rich richer but when it comes to the guy that is working two or three jobs just to keep his head above water the republicans always clutch their pearls and say oh my gosh, what about the deficit. >> host: thank you for the call. mr. ortiz, go ahead. >> guest: well, i think his point there is really can see see where he is coming from. there will be a technology hit and i think i mentioned that in there is an inflection point and when you think where we were ten years ago with plasma screens and all of that there were thousands of dollars for right now there are hundreds of dollars and if you look for example a mcdonald's in arlington, virginia they have completely replaced the cashiers with kiosks. they only have two people now working to get the food out and ultimately there will be a point where the people who will be

making the actual food behind the scene will be replaced as well but look at door -- just invested in. again, reality is we have to keep these training wages where they are. let's go ahead and bring up a little if we need to but you got to remember what those wages are for. they are entry-level positions, entry-level jobs, training wages. if they are there for long-term that's a bigger issue and we got to identify and give them the skills they need. what i don't understand is why we are so busy trying to raise the floor when we should raise the ceiling. let's fight the get those people who want and over no fault of their own are stuck in these minimum wave jobs and let's give them the skills that they want and they need to be able to be whatever they want to be and we don't need to mandate the federal mandate wage of the 15 to make this happen. >> host: story and wall street

journal saying as part of the building support for the plan particularly on the 15 hour dollar front that could be an aspect of it mr. biden will meet with leaders from j.p. morgan, chase, walmart et cetera. >> guest: those sound like small businesses. >> host: but the business roundtable has been pushed back across the board saying it reflects pay should reflect where people live. one aspect of that, isn't that something that could be considered, geographic location? >> guest: i would deftly consider that over federally mandated wage. ...

even within industry, there's differences. look at the profit margin of amazon versus the profit margin of a restaurant. we're 35% profit margins for amazon and the restaurant is one to 3%. it's apples and oranges. >> host: of viewer fun can to sink this is directing this to you saying you can bet mr. ortiz is not supportive of union jobs. if an employer can't manage nine dollars and out within two years should the really big business? >> guest: i talked to small businesses all the time. i come from, my dad was a tailor, my mom was a housekeeper. i'm also a little taken back because i completely understand what it's like, it's not against union wages. religions federally mandated

wages that take nothing to account the truth of the reality of running the business. i ran a small business a website to sign the back of the check and the front of the check. from the perspective we need to be sensitive to the small business owners. they are the backbone. two-thirds of new job growth within the hands of small businesses, over half of our economy, half the jobs are in the hands of these small businesses. if you want to decimate our economy, start decimating our small businesses that way we are with these lockdowns and the teachers refusing to go back to school because now pairs can't go back to school. i stand up for our small business everyday. >> host: and the spirit of that last statement what defines a small business and your mind? >> guest: anything from sole proprietor one up to our sweet spot is about 65-100 employees. anything above that quite frankly are doing pretty well on their own. they had their own cpa's and lawyers. they have opportunities to engage in some kind of political

lobbying and something we really try to represent the smalls of the smallest small businesses. from that perspective we're proud of the work. we represent that pizza owner down the street, , the dry cleaner, the hairdresser, the yoga instructors and fitness instructors. we represent all of that, 23,000,004 sole proprietors and the other 7 million roughly have employees with only about the top riches of the small businesses are probably about 100,000 of them. they don't need a representation. they don't need our help because they're they are doing just fine on their own. >> host: let's hear from mike in new jersey for alfredo ortiz of the job creators network was calling in an ally for democrats. go ahead. >> caller: good morning and thank you for taking my call c-span. he do an outstanding job. in the beginning of the conversation, first of all, the teachers have the reasons in certain areas of why not going

back to school but that's another argument for another day. the $15 $15 minimum wage ine beginning you said if you use the $15 minimum wage to increase companies to go to automation. that's going to happen no matter what. that's not a good argument. the other point is you can make the argument in certain areas the $15 an hour minimum wage may not work and in certain areas it may work. as far as like children or young people going into the jobs come if they could adjust it there. the $15 $15 an hour wage is- it was originally started at the minimum wage as a starting wage but it turned into a regular wage at a lot of areas for certain parts of labor. i think $15 an hour wage shouldn't be turned into, put in with the stimulus package that is been made now but it's something that this contrast to look into. seven dollars plus is not going to cut it. thank you for taking my call.

>> guest: i will start with the last part of your question and i agree. it should not be included in the covert release bill. i do think it's a very important topic to be discussed. i like the earth income tax could as a possible solution to addressing the problem because quite frankly i think you and i are in agreement with to make sure we address those folks are making that entry-level wage who had been there for a while, who have been more than six months, who had been more than in those jobs more than a year or or two years or three years. that's the broader systemic issue we need to address and that's the biggest concern. in terms of the automation point you are making, you are right it is going to be happening. it's just the pace at which it's going to happen will accelerate when you have these federally mandated wages so that inflection point may have been four or five your standard would all of a sudden is moved by couple years or three years

closer to us because that automation continues to go down in terms of cost and price. >> host: one of the elements of the american rescue plan would include expanding hate sickly for workers. what do you think about that proposal? >> guest: from that perspective if we look at it as a true short-term covid issue i understand why it is needed but what we need to look at is all the other aspects of social programs that are being out there that have already been voted on, whether money is already in play. i keep coming back to the earned income tax credit. it's a very efficient and effective plan. i like the idea of expanding that. it's got some problems. i think with some tweaks we could use and leverage. something is in place would've had put a lot of bureaucracy in place to get that done. we have to let americans understand this is applicable to them and we can give them proper support without killing our small businesses. it's the backbone of our community, 30 million small businesses.

i saw a report that said its potential a third of those businesses may not make it to may. how are we going to take care of 10 million small businesses that employ people if they are not in business? how can we take of those folks? this is a real problem and by adding a $15 minimum wage we are still talking 31% increase in debt by june of this year according to bernie sanders played. >> host: when it comes to sickly could an argument be made if you offer sickly and that potential keeps a workforce of place and that helps the employer over the long run? >> guest: as long as we don't create a situation like with the last unemployment checks where you created an incentive to stay home. we can't keep creating incentives where people make more money by staying home than they do working. this was a real serious issue that our small business owners were very loud about that nobody heard that said this will be issued to bring workers back and it really was and it was

difficult for our our small business owners. i'm not talking an amazon type business. i'm talking that pizza guy down the street, the hair salon, it was very, very difficult for them to bring back their workers. >> host: from washington state, independent line, this is pam. go ahead. >> caller: so up in redmond, washington, that's home of nintendo, bellevue is microsoft, if you go into those communities you'll see there's a lot of immigrant workers from asia. that is one issue. two, is her vocational training and high schools here in america completely gone away. and then three, for technology taking over small businesses, how do we bring back the manufacturing to our american people that are not getting the jobs in bellevue and redmond? technology is taking over but when you drive through small

towns in america like olympia, washington, salem, oregon, you see boarded-up store. >> the stores are not technology stores. those doors are small businesses that were started because of the housing crisis in 2008. people who had to create a way to make money and of those jobs are gone. our vocational training has been completely swiped out of high school education. somewhere as a small business proponent do you play an active role in bringing manufacturing back to this country? >> guest: those are great questions. the vocational training i go back, we are big believers in that. we have a program called against the fight for 50 which is a fight for $50,000 per your jobs. we're. were talking journeymen, electricians, summers. entry-level jobs are in the 50,000+ dollars range. i'm not sure if any listeners are from new york but i'll tell you it's impossible to fight an

electrician or plumber or anybody in the home rebuilding industry across the country almost, but to your point, vocational training has basically been stripped out of our schools. we have to bring that back. it was made in court went on under the obama administration. there's nothing in cool about great vocational jobs. we do have to bring this back. entrance of what our small business of doing to try to bring some of those business of fact, quite frankly when proposing that as we do some of this onshoring of business and especially with the ppp, the protection equipment the people are talking about and pharmaceuticals and bringing some of that stuff back from china back to the u.s. for manufacturing here, let's give small businesses a disproportionate opportunity to some of that business. let's set up the infrastructure for sba to give these poor businesses quite frankly i don't fault of their own through this pandemic have lost everything that the old and the employees

as well, , let's give these fols an opportunity, again a disproportionate opportunity and a shot at some of the stuff and, quite frankly, when quick plug for what were trying to do here was we have actually we launched a program that we had a few years back, bring small businesses back program and this is one of the ideas we have to try to do that is to give folks that opportunity to displaced entrepreneurs of the call them to have a shot at some of the businesses we will try to bring back from china. >> host: we are seeing the biden administration make changes to the h-1b visas program which the previous call region. how much of an impact is that on small business? >> guest: not as much. we are talking the big tech firms, they are the ones are really involved in that conversation. the h-1b visas not really something that comes up top of my top three. were talking for our small business owners, they worry about how will they keep the doors open tomorrow, worried about rising healthcare costs,

worried about taxes possibly going up, worried about the potential of this payroll tax cap being removed and that having an impact on them and they are worried about for the regulations and rising energy costs because of some of the green new deal proposals that are being discussed. >> host: from baltimore, maryland, also an independent line this is stacy. >> caller: good morning and thank you for c-span. a couple points i would like your guest to address. i think automation is going to happen anyway, like a couple of the other callers said. i think that's why you are hearing more about the universal basic income. your guest also talked about skilled workers, and i was a skilled worker, or am a skilled worker, but a profession which was in the restaurant industry still was kind of a low-wage. i mean, i was fortunate but a

lot of people in that industry in the restaurant industry are not paid very well. also i don't feel like the answer -- he answered the question but sickly, and he seems to be against sickly. i also have a question, what do you mean by light the obama administration made it uncool for trade and everything like that? what i remember from that period was his crackdown on for-profit schools who take advantage of lower income people who are trying to move up in this society. >> host: quite a list. we will let our guest respond to that. >> guest: hopefully keeping a check credit to make sure i hit everything but in terms of vocational training, look, , we are proponents of that, and under the obama administration the wasn't as much of a push for vocational training. it was about for your education.

while i i was fortunate enougo be able to attend, i was the first one in my family to finish high school, college, grad school and that was all through the grace of god and hard work through my mother. i love higher education but it o believe there is huge opportunity for folks to go into different vocations and two different skilled occupations like electricians, like plumbers but that was not made to be cool. cool. it was a good idea to go to your for your education and, quite frankly, people were arming against the pic as by bernie said it discussing forgiving when quick $5 trillion that debt because children couldn't make those decisions well enough on their own so let's go ahead and forgive it. but look, if you look at the endowment of some of these for your college educations or universities, they are booming. they are doing extremely well.

my concern is people graduating from this four-year colleges in debt of $250,000 or more and being told when they were going in that you are not somebody unless you have a four-year degree. i just don't agree with that. even though i benefited person from that, a lot of folks just want that. and what you have a great life and be able to be great electricians plumbers and we need to support that and salute that the those jobs are needed in america. our small business owners are struggling to find people with those kinds of proper skills. we need to bring that back. one of your callers mentioned it was stripped out of school. i agree we need to bring that back as part of our high school education curriculum. that's extremely critical. in terms of sick leave i'm not opposed to sickly. i just don't want sickly to be something that just as a never ending story. we need to be able to address the issues of an economy that is really suffering right now. we barely posted job increases

in the last report and we still have a million people who are still out of jobs from february of 2020 and get almost 4.5 million jobs people have left, have left the labor force so in addition, in addition to the 10 billion so we're wg 15 million people that frankly are not currently employed or have left the labor force. this is a real issue the writ to keep the economy going, how to open up the economy. >> host: one more tweet for you, mr. ortiz. why is the viability of the business more important than the viability of the worker? of business should thrive because its workers earn less than a living wage. >> guest: last time i checked you will not have workers unless you have a job. you have two start with the business that will employ people. the government is not in the business and should it be in the business of government. the government is in the business quite frankly of creating an environment that

facilitates private investment that facilitates growth of the economy. they should not be in the business of government. stacey abrams said that in georgia and i completely disagree. it's private business and without private business, without small businesses, medium businesses or large businesses people don't have jobs and that's just the reality. >> host: job creators network.com, alfredo ortiz was at the president and ceo of the job creators network. thanks for your time today. >> guest: thank you. >> hi, everyone. happy tuesday. all right. a couple of items for all of you at the top a lot of you have asked me not initially but in general what's next? what we focused on next? the edges the president is going to continue working on getting the american rescue plan passed. that is his top priority. he is traveling to wisconsin later thi