{"id":2470,"date":"2012-11-16T09:57:36","date_gmt":"2012-11-16T14:57:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/nanotechnology\/?p=2470"},"modified":"2013-09-12T10:43:41","modified_gmt":"2013-09-12T15:43:41","slug":"small-is-beautiful-polling-shows-huge-bipartisan-support-for-tsca-reform-among-small-business-owners","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/2012\/11\/16\/small-is-beautiful-polling-shows-huge-bipartisan-support-for-tsca-reform-among-small-business-owners\/","title":{"rendered":"Small is beautiful: Polling shows huge bipartisan support for TSCA reform among small business owners"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>Alissa Sasso is a Chemicals Policy Fellow.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Calibri;color: #000000;font-size: medium\">This week, the American Sustainable Business Council released the results of a <\/span><a href=\"http:\/\/asbcouncil.org\/toxic-chemicals-poll\"><span style=\"font-family: Calibri;color: #0000ff;font-size: medium\">bipartisan national survey<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-family: Calibri;color: #000000;font-size: medium\"> of 511 small business owners conducted by Lake Research Partners and Public Opinion Strategies. The survey showed that small business owners, <\/span><a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/nanotechnology\/2010\/09\/14\/voters-say-i-am-not-a-guinea-pig-new-poll-shows-strong-deep-bipartisan-support-for-comprehensive-chemical-safety-overhaul\/\"><span style=\"font-family: Calibri;font-size: medium\">just like voters<\/span><\/a><span style=\"color: #000000\"><span style=\"font-family: Calibri\"><span style=\"font-size: medium\">, support stronger chemical safety regulations to mitigate the risks posed to human health and the environment by toxic chemicals.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Calibri;color: #000000;font-size: medium\">Small business owners are an important part of the discussion on TSCA reform; the chemical industry frequently uses this group as <\/span><a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/nanotechnology\/2011\/04\/07\/a-sea-of-red-herrings-is-behind-opposition-to-epa%e2%80%99s-proposal-to-enhance-chemical-reporting\/\"><span style=\"font-family: Calibri;color: #0000ff;font-size: medium\">an excuse to oppose tighter regulations<\/span><\/a><span style=\"color: #000000\"><span style=\"font-family: Calibri\"><span style=\"font-size: medium\">, claiming that these regulations are \u201cbad for business\u201d and would detrimentally harm small business owners. In contrast, the survey shows that there is broad consensus among small business owners on the need to ensure the safety of their products and their customers.\u00a0 <!--more--><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Calibri;color: #000000;font-size: medium\">Especially encouraging is that 73% of small business owners are in favor of TSCA reform similar to that provided in the <\/span><a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/nanotechnology\/files\/2012\/07\/Summary-of-Changes-to-Safe-Chemicals-Act-7.24.12.pdf\"><span style=\"font-family: Calibri;color: #0000ff;font-size: medium\">Safe Chemicals Act of 2011<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-family: Calibri\"><span style=\"font-size: medium\"><span style=\"color: #000000\">: chemical manufacturers would be required to prove a chemical is safe in order to use it; EPA would have the ability to limit or ban uses of a dangerous chemical; and incentives would be provided to support for innovation towards safer chemicals. On top of this, specific aspects of the Act\u2019s reforms garnered support as high as 90% of those surveyed, results which held across party affiliations.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"font-family: Calibri\"><span style=\"font-size: medium\"><span style=\"color: #000000\">Support driven by the values of safety, responsibility and accessibility to information<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Calibri\"><span style=\"font-size: medium\"><span style=\"color: #000000\">Here are the results for some specific proposed reforms that are relevant to small business owners:<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000\"><span style=\"font-family: Calibri\"><span style=\"font-size: medium\">91% support chemical manufacturers being held responsible for ensuring their chemicals are safe.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000\"><span style=\"font-family: Calibri\"><span style=\"font-size: medium\">94% believe that companies using chemicals of concern to human health should disclose their presence to customers and to the public.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000\"><span style=\"font-family: Calibri\"><span style=\"font-size: medium\">75% support stricter regulations of chemicals used in everyday products. <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000\"><span style=\"font-family: Calibri\"><span style=\"font-size: medium\">92% support a public, easily accessible database identifying chemicals of high concern to human and environmental health.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000\"><span style=\"font-size: medium\"><span style=\"font-family: Calibri\">82% believe businesses should be required to share chemical ingredient information all along the supply chain \u2013 from chemical manufacturer to final product manufacturer.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: medium\"><span style=\"color: #000000\"><span style=\"font-family: Calibri\">If these results aren\u2019t enough to convince you that TSCA reform is good for small business, perhaps the strikingly high degree of support among Republican small business owners may help. Placing the burden of proof on chemical manufacturers, a central tenant of the Safe Chemical Act, is supported by 89% of Republicans as well as 96% of Democrats. Increasing the transparency of the chemical industry through the disclosure of chemicals of concern and developing an easily accessible database have even more support from Republicans, 93% and 91% respectively. These questions had almost complete agreement across the board, with 96% of Democrats also supporting both reforms.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"font-size: medium\"><span style=\"color: #000000\"><span style=\"font-family: Calibri\">The excuses stop here<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: medium\"><span style=\"color: #000000\"><span style=\"font-family: Calibri\">The fact that small business owners show an overwhelming consensus in support of the very regulations that too many in the chemical industry are trying to \u201cprotect\u201d them from should, we hope, be enough to end the \u201cbad for business\u201d excuse. The current lack of protection from exposure to toxic chemicals found in everyday products being sold to consumers <em>is <\/em>bad for business. The values driving the support we see from small business owners \u2013 safety, responsibility, and accessibility \u2013 are what TSCA reform should be all about. <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Alissa Sasso is a Chemicals Policy Fellow. This week, the American Sustainable Business Council released the results of a bipartisan national survey of 511 small business owners conducted by Lake Research Partners and Public Opinion Strategies. The survey showed that small business owners, just like voters, support stronger chemical safety regulations to mitigate the risks &#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8643,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[44,114108],"tags":[5019,39993,5021,39595,39989],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-2470","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-policy","category-tsca","tag-consumer-products","tag-general-interest","tag-chemical-industry-tactics","tag-safe-chemicals-acts","tag-small-business"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2470","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8643"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2470"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2470\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2470"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2470"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2470"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=2470"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}