[jdavis703]

I'm an HNer who has started and sold my own businesses, I have family who have founded & operated businesses in highly regulated areas, and I'm an investor in startups. I have also been audited by the IRS (the US tax service). One wrong step does not mean you're toast. It means you need to admit and fix your mistake and make sure it doesn't happen again.

I'm sure agencies such as the FAA or DOE might be more of a PITA to deal with. But that's because they're regulating functions that are literally life and death.

[pjkundert]

You sound very successful; unfortunately, most small businesses remain small. Year by year, the ever-increasing drain of time, energy and money expended to accomplish nothing of value (to the owner, their families who often work in the business, or to their clients) increases.

Unless they quickly cross this "chasm of despair", it is inevitable that the small business owner will simply give up and close the business.

Soon, all you have left is dead-eyed, heartless corporate strip-miners, laying waste the landscape (see: modern industrial livestock production and processing, vs. local farmers and butchers). And they have a very limited risk of any viable competitors crossing the chasm.

There is one thing that could change this -- remove the "economies of scale" for compliance to all regulatory and tax requirements. This means: the amount it costs the company to comply is calculated to be in direct proportion to their gross revenue.

If it costs a small business 10% of their gross revenue to comply, but it costs Apple, Eli Lilly, Exxon, Walmart etc. only .1% of their gross revenue, then taxes would be levied/refunded to ensure that the regulatory burden is equitable.

You would be able see the big corporation's lobbyists lining up in Washington, DC from orbit, to get the regulatory burdens on small businesses reduced!