"NO" on Reauthorization of Small Business Subsidies
"NO" on Reauthorization of Small Business Subsidies
In March, the Senate voted to invoke cloture on the motion to proceed to an eight-year reauthorization bill (S. 493) for the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) and Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) programs. According to the Congressional Budget Office, S. 493 would authorize $150 million in spending over the 2012-2016 period, and would extend both programs through 2019.
The programs are aimed at incentivizing (i.e. subsidizing) small business activities geared towards expansion, innovation and commercialization. As with any targeted government incentive or subsidy, these programs distort the existing market place by picking winners and losers. Subsidies—whether for big business or small business, oil energy or wind energy, or gasoline cars or natural gas cars—creates inefficiencies, miss-allocates resources, wastes taxpayer dollars, and prematurely forces technologies into the marketplace, all while taking away the incentive to lower costs.
Heritage Action opposed S. 493 and included cloture on the motion to proceed as a key vote on our scorecard.
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"NO" on Reauthorization of Small Business Subsidies