By John Stossel
Want to open a business in America? It isn’t easy.
In Midway, Ga., a 14-year-old girl and her 10-year-old sister sold lemonade from their front yard. Two police officers bought some. But the next day, different officers ordered them to close their stand.
Their father went to city hall to try to find out why. The clerk laughed and said she didn’t know. Eventually, Police Chief Kelly Morningstar explained, “We were not aware of how the lemonade was made, who made the lemonade and of what the lemonade was made with.”
Give me a break. If she doesn’t know, so what? But kids trying their first experiment with entrepreneurship are being shut down all over America. Officials in Hazelwood, Ill., ordered little girls to stop selling Girl Scout cookies.
It made me want to try to jump through the legal hoops required to open a simple lemonade stand in New York City. Here’s some of what one has to do:
— Register as sole proprietor with the County Clerk’s Office (must be done in person)
— Apply to the IRS for an Employer Identification Number.
— Complete 15-hr Food Protection Course!
— After the course, register for an exam that takes 1 hour. You must score 70 percent to pass. (Sample question: “What toxins are associated with the puffer fish?”) If you pass, allow three to five weeks for delivery of Food Protection Certificate.
— Register for sales tax Certificate of Authority
— Apply for a Temporary Food Service Establishment Permit. Must bring copies of the previous documents and completed forms to the Consumer Affairs Licensing Center.
Then, at least 21 days before opening your establishment, you must arrange for an inspection with the Health Department’s Bureau of Food Safety and Community Sanitation. It takes about three weeks to get your appointment. If you pass, you can set up a business once you:
Years ago, and by years I really mean decades, my brother and I attempted to make a little money at our local sportsmen’s club. This club was a campground on a small lake that always attracted large numbers of people on holiday weekends like July 4th. Our plan? To make hanging “windmills” out of used soda pop and beer cans. Being that my dad worked as a heating and a/c repairman, we had the access to the sheetmetal cutters and heavy wire needed. Two cans, some cutting, wire bending, and we had our “windmill”. They actually were a big hit and nearly every camper had at least one hanging off of their awning poles, spinning in the wind flashing colors from the various cans including Budweiser, Busch, Mt. Dew, Coke, and numerous others. $1.00. Materials free other than the labor to collect the cans. If I remember correctly, we made upwards of $50 dollars for our efforts.
A kid couldn’t do such a thing nowadays. Too many “mommies” around would be worried about the sharp edges cutting the kids. A lawsuit or two from the spinning knives cutting into someone. And quite possibly, considering the state was Illinois, a visit by the local sheetmetal workers union because we were somehow infringing upon their area of work. Now, I kid, of course, but when local bureaucrats can stop kids from selling lemonade out in front of their home, anything is possible.
” a visit by the local sheetmetal workers union because we were somehow infringing upon their area of work”
No joke, you are dead serious.
No Volunteer Crossing Guards Allowed.
A Wausau public employee union filed a grievance to prohibit a local volunteer from serving as a school crossing guard. The 86-year-old lives just two blocks away and serves everyday free of charge.
http://bit.ly/wElrm1
THIS is the TRAGIC REVERSE of helping the young to get a taste of prosperity out of real efforts and creativity, and a taste of PRIDE OF ACCOMPLISHMENT
so good for their young brain activating the right moral of how to succeed by way of do it yourself,
and always or most of the time backed up by parents or friends older then they are,
WOW I’m listening to BRIGITE GABRIEL about the PRESIDENT APOLOGY TO AFGHANISTAN ,
she sure tell it how it should have been, he desecrated our COUNTRY GREATNESS, OUR MILITARY BRAVES, DYING FOR FREEDOM OF OUR COUNTRY. he should have ask for apology from them,
and OBAMA APOLOGY DID NOT HELP IN ANY WAY, NOTHING HELP THOSE MOBS OF HATERS,