Bush, Dukakis and business - George Bush, Michael Dukakis - includes related article on Michael Dukakis's tax policy

Nation's Business, Oct, 1988 by Albert G. Holzinger

Bush, Dukakis And Business The candidates differ on insurance, benefits and other policy matters, so business people must study carefully before voting November 8.

Although Vice President George Bush and Gov. Michael Dukakis agree that the health of small business is vital to the overall economy, they differ sharply on what government should and should not do to preserve that health.

Because the candidates' concepts of tender, loving care for entrepreneurship differ substantially, business people will have to study carefully and think hard before casting their ballots November 8.

Nation's Business has obtained the views of Bush and Dukakis on benchmark small-business issues, as defined by delegates to the most recent White House Conference on Small Business.

The conference, held in August, 1986, brought to Washington almost 2,000 delegates from a cross section of American small firms, to identify 60 policy priorities.

A few conference recommendations, such as maintaining the Small Business Administration as an independent agency, have been adopted by the President and Congress, but most, including many top policy options, await consideration by the next administration, House and Senate.

Here is a comparison of the president candidates' positions on the principal policy recommendations of the White House Conferenre on Small Business:

Insurance Two sultry summers ago, most business owners and professionals were sweating profusely about the affordability and availability of commercial insurance. The White House conference made its highest priority gaining wholesale reform of the civil-justice system, which had been churning out astronomical damage awards almost routinely.

The so-called liability crisis has abated somewhat, though more as the result of market forces than of action in Washington, but insurability remains a leading concern of many of America's entrepreneurs.

Bush and Dukakis would take much different approaches to further stemming the liability crisis.

"Fairness, balance and predictability must be restored to this nation's liability system ... while insuring just compensation to those injured through the fault of others, says the GOP candidate. "I believe public officials must do all they can to ensure appropriate [tort] reforms are enacted in all our states and in the federal [product-liability] system." Bush endorses:

. Restoring fault as the standard for damage recovery.

. Eliminating the deep-pocket rule, under which minimally involved and financially sound defendants can be made to pay 100 percent of plaintiffs' claims.

. Expanding the use of alternative dispute-resolution mechanisms, including binding arbitration and mediation.

In contrast, Dukakis believes "consumers have been generally well served" by the current, state-regulated insurance system. Therefore, Dukakis would oppose enactment of a federal product-liability statute or other tort reforms, though he would "encourage" drafting a model code that states could choose to adopt as their own.

The Democratic candidate believes if there is a liability problem, it stems from practices of the insurance industry, and he has proposed review of the industry's antitrust exemption under the McCarran-Ferguson Act.

Mandated Benefits With the federal budget deficit at its peak level of more than $200 billion two years ago, some in Congress decided the time was right to begin requiring businesses to provide benefits too rich for the blood of the federal treasury.

Small-business delegates to the White House conference took the threat of parental and medical leaves, health insurance and other mandated benefits seriously enough to make opposition to such proposals their second-highest priority. Bush and Dukakis differ completely about this issue.

Says Dukakis: "This spring, I signed into law a plan to provide universal health care for the citizens of Massachusetts. As President, I would support Senator [Edward M.] Kennedy's health-care bill, which would require employers to provide basic health insurance for their employees and [their] dependents."

Dukakis does add, however, that he would seek to change some provisions of the Kennedy bill to mitigate its impact on the smallest firms.

Bush would "shun ... mandatory health-care proposals" because "the less government is involved in the day-to-day administration of health care, the more efficiently it will run."

Similarly, Bush opposes mandated parental and medical leaves but encourages "private efforts to establish flexible standards allowing workers with newborn children [or] seriously ill family members ... to follow through on important family-related work."

Dukakis backs mandatory leaves "of lengths sufficient to fulfill their underlying purposes." Employees on parental and medical leaves "should be protected against loss of ... seniority and benefits," he says.

Dukakis supported the recently enacted mandatory plant-closing notification bill. Bush opposed the legislation, and his vice presidential running mate, Dan Quayle of Indiana, led efforts to scuttle the measure in the Senate.