Company Profile
Main Street Alliance
Company Overview
Founded in 2008, MSA is a growing national network of state-based small business coalitions working to ensure that the voices of real small business owners are heard on public policy issues that are critical to their businesses, their employees, and the communities that they serve.
MSA drives all our work with a racial and gender justice and equity lens. We work on the ground to organize business owners to advocate for smart policies that help entrepreneurs, families and communities. MSA develops strong small business voices in three core program areas: Prosperous Local Economies, Smart Public Investment, and Good Government.
Company History
For decades, large corporate players have perpetrated a kind of political identity theft against the country’s small businesses. These players have persuaded lawmakers and much of the public that businesses generally, large and small, share common interests expressed through a “business-friendly agenda” focused on tax breaks, deregulation, and privatization.
This notion of shared interests across business isn’t just wrong; it also gets in the way of robust public conversation about the types of public investments we should make and the variety of rules we should set for our economy. It implies that only one set of rules benefits business, foreclosing questions about what kinds of businesses our country should nurture and what approaches will support those businesses. The results often are policies that not only ignore the interests of real small business owners but undermine those interests.
Fortunately, some political leaders are finally coming around to the idea that small businesses have different needs and priorities than large corporations do. These leaders are beginning to see that the country requires a more nuanced role for government and a more sophisticated approach to markets, competition, and taxes—and that, far from burdening small businesses, these shifts will help small businesses thrive.
These shifts in elected leaders have come about as a result of tireless and intensive work organizing small business owners to get their own voices heard in public policy conversations, to be at the table to help create and shape policy solutions, and to tell their personal stories in the media.
Since 2008 Main Street Alliance has grown from a strategy to elevate small business voices on healthcare to a powerful constituency organization working across a wide variety of issues. In the last year, we have gone through several exciting changes including a shift away from fiscal sponsorship to our own independent 501(c)(3) organization, Business Education Fund, with our 501(c)(4) sister organization, Business Action Fund.
Notable Accomplishments / Recognition
Main Street Alliance (MSA) works to elevate the voices of small business owners on public policy issues that impact their
businesses, their employees and the communities they serve. Founded in 2008 to create opportunities for small business
owners to speak for themselves about health care reform, Main Street Alliance is a fast-growing national network, active at
the city, state and national levels, on a wide variety of policy issues, including tax and budget reform, health care, retirement
security, job quality, including earned sick time, minimum wage, paid family leave, fair-chance hiring and wage theft,
immigration reform and economic development issues. In recent years, Main Street Action has been working to put small
business issues front and center in elections. Over the past, year MSA has played a critical role in shaping the conversation
on the effects of COVID-19 on our small business economy.
Benefits
+ flexible scheduling, family friendly workplace, life insurance, 2 weeks paid time off at the end of the year in addition to paid vacation