If yours is one of the 10 million small businesses that generated a share of the aggregate $194 billion in sales rung up online in 2011, you're likely aware that, new this year, the IRS requires merchant- and third-party-payment processors, such as PayPal and Square, to report on form 1099-K any income paid through their services to individuals and small businesses. And you might be interested in a report that appeared on TechCrunch yesterday under the headline, "New Government ePayment Regulation Costs Small Business $10 Billion."Complying with new e-commerce tax can be costly

As TechCrunch contributor Steven Aldrich explains it:

"The 1099-K form reports 'gross sales' made, without adjusting for items like fees, refunds, returns, or fraudulent transactions. … [B]usiness owners are saying that the gross sales number on the form is coming in much higher than they expected and is causing each business to spend significant time and money to get their taxes done correctly. …Without taking this new law into account, $140 billion and 3.5

Which small business group represents you on health care reform? The National Federation of Independent Business will present its case against the Affordable Care Act to the Supreme Court this week. But two other organizations, the Small Business Majority and the Main Street Alliance, submitted a friend-of-the-court brief defending ObamaCare. And a fourth group, the National Association for the Self-Employed, would like to see the Court strike down the part of the law  mandating that all individuals purchase health insurance, but opposes overturning the law altogether.

Small businesses are at odds about the Affordable Care ActAs business owners know well by now, the health reform law will legally obligate private, state, and local government employers with 50 or more full-time employees to provide "minimum essential coverage" and to pay for at least 60 percent of the actual costs of employees' benefits by 2014. Those employers who don't will be penalized $2,000 per employee beyond their first 30 employees, payable to the IRS. The mandate

Yahoo! SmallBizVote readers responded with overwhelming cynicism to a report we posted yesterday about an Executive Office memo to federal regulatory agencies. The guidance, issued on Tuesday by regulatory chief Cass Sunstein, instructed agencies to consider the special challenges that redundant, overlapping, and inconsistent regulations pose to small businesses and startups.

SmallBizVote readers say the memo is phony election-year pandering. In 14 comments and 71 "likes" (indicated by readers who gave a comment the "thumbs up" symbol), readers expressed their resounding distrust of the Administration's too-little-too-late guidance.Yahoo! readers say a government regulatory guidance is political pandering

"It takes election season for the White House to hear your cries," remarked a reader with the pseudonym He Lies.  Hope commented, "So the EPA regulations, Obamacare, and Dodd-Frank are job killers...duh!" And T-Rex wrote, "What a coincidence. Obama is suddenly worried about small businesses! Appears to be major league pandering in an election year."

Reader

Small business owners struggling under the burden of regulatory compliance, take heart. In this election season, the White House hears your cries.

The Executive Office yesterday reminded the heads of federal departments and agencies that some "sectors and industries face a significant number of regulatory requirements, some of which may be redundant, inconsistent, or overlapping." A guidance "effective immediately" urged agencies to take into account the costs of cumulative regulations that "can create special challenges for small businesses and startups."Regs create "special challenges" for small businesses

Cass Sunstein, the Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs within the Office of Management and Budget, instructed agencies to "avoid unintentional burdens that could result from an exclusive focus on the most recent regulatory activities."

Sunstein's memo follows a meeting earlier this month between President Obama and the Business Roundtable, an association of CEOs of leading U.S. companies with combined

While politicians argue about how best to halt rising gas prices, business owners just want relief. And fast.

The Small Business & Entrepreneurship Council reported today that 72 percent of small business owners say that increasingly high gas prices are impacting their business, and a majority are also dissatisfied with the overall direction of federal policies meant to help the economy.Gas prices are hurting businesses

The survey of 304 small business owners was conducted in late February before gas prices had reached today's highs of $3.80 per gallon. Even then, 43 percent said their business would not survive if energy prices continue to remain high or increase further.

The SBEC suggests that advancing pro-energy policies, including the approval of the Keystone XL pipeline, is the best route the government could take now to help small businesses. "The U.S. cannot allow world events, supply disruptions and global demand surges to control the fate of our economy or global competitiveness. We must take full advantage

Earlier today we posted a Yahoo! Small Business Advisor article about  legislation that would make it legal for entrepreneurs to sell small stakes in their companies through online crowdfunding platforms. Just a few hours later, the House voted to pass the Jumpstart Our Business Startups (JOBS) Act, a package of six separate pieces of legislation, including the one supporting crowdfunding that it had approved in a vote last November. The Senate will consider a similar bill next week.

Business owners have told Yahoo! that a lack of access to capital is hurting them. Crowdfunding is just one element of the JOBS Act meant to address that problem. As the Washington Post reported this afternoon, small business advocates are applauding the bipartisan passage of a bill that "would ease Securities and Exchange Commission rules that can impede or slow the process for companies trying to enter the public markets."

Aside from legalizing crowdfunding--which would let proprietors raise investments

The Young Entrepreneur Council today kicked off a national initiative to steer politicians' attention toward policies and programs that YEC and its partners say would encourage and enable more entrepreneurship among young people and tackle "an epidemic of youth unemployment and underemployment."   

YEC's ambitious and energetic founder Scott Gerber, a 27-year-old self-proclaimed serial entrepreneur, says his organization's #FixYoungAmerica movement will feature a social media campaign, nationwide events, and the publication of a compilation of essays on entrepreneurship written by the country's "brightest intellectuals, nonprofit founders, philanthropists, educators, politicians, and entrepreneurs."

He says the goal is to create a "positive conversation" about how to build solutions for young entrepreneurs. "Whenever you hear about youth unemployment, it's always in the negative. We're the 'lost generation'," Gerber says. He'd prefer to focus on what's working and legislate from that

Karen G. Mills was sworn in as the 23rd Administrator of the U.S. Small Business Administration in April 2009. Last month, at the same time he sought Congressional authority to reorganize and consolidate SBA with the Commerce Department and the U.S. Trade and Development Agency, President Obama elevated Mills' post to the Cabinet level.

Yahoo! Small Business had the opportunity last week to ask Mills to discuss her new post, her plans for 2012, and her take on small business owners' top priorities now.

U.S. Small Business Administration Administrator Karen Mills visits a North Carolina small business

SmallBiz Vote: What does the elevation of the Small Business Administration to the cabinet level right now mean for small business owners? How will your new seat at the cabinet table impact what you are able to accomplish for small businesses, near-term and long-term?

Karen G. Mills: Small businesses are the economic engine of our economy. They create 2 out of every 3 new jobs. Roughly half of America owns or works for a small business.

The President understands the importance of