Prairie State Wire

Conservative activist Peter Breen argues Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s approach to controlling the COVID-19 pandemic was always doomed to fail.

“From the very beginning, the Pritzker administration has shown a callous disregard for the small business industry as opposed to big business,” Breen told the Prairie State Wire. “The governor immediately issued rules that allowed larger companies to continue operating while shuttering smaller enterprises. There’s nothing the administration has offered up that makes that seem logical.”

Breen, however, rages few can dispute the impact, pointing to a new TrackTheRecovery.org analysis that finds since the beginning of the year the state has lost more than a third of all small businesses. Overall, data compiled by Harvard and Brown universities and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation shows as of Nov. 16, 2020 the number of small businesses open dipped by some 35.4 percent compared to January of this year with the industry also experiencing a revenue decline topping 39% since January.

“By every measure, big business has been protected while small businesses have been left to die out before our eyes,” Breen added.

National Federation of Independent Business Illinois State Director Mark Grant points out that running a small business in Illinois was already quite the challenge even before the pandemic hit, given such factors as higher property taxes and workers’ compensation.

Breen laments, none of that seems to matter to Pritzker.

“This governor doesn’t have the experience or contacts in the small business industry to help him understand the toll his orders are taking on people and businesses,” Breen said. “If he were more in touch with every day Illinoisans and small business owners, he would be doing things much differently.”