Jacob vs. The Government

I was standing in a line in the business licensing office at City Hall today. The guy in front of me had it really rough. He had paid for a license to sell alcohol back in November but the city hadn’t given him his permit yet. He had called the lady in charge of liquor licenses numerous times and at various times of the day but kept getting her voice mail. He asked if she were in, the man behind the counter replied that she was at lunch. It was 2:30 PM.

In the meantime, cops had issued him several tickets for not having a license.

“It’s the lack of a profit motive”, I said, “They have no incentive to serve their customers.”

As he stormed out of the office he muttered “Good luck” to the rest of us standing in line.

I wondered why a businessman should need a permit at all.

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I thought it would be a great idea to sell flowers on the street in downtown Atlanta. At lunchtime and rush hour the area called “five points” is booming. People are everywhere. If I could sell 10 flowers an hour I’d be making profit at a rate of $20/hr, which would be a pretty decent living.

I think I can sell a lot more than 10 flowers in an hour.

I found out from the internet that I need a “public vendor” license in order to be able to sell items on city streets. Undaunted, I went down to City Hall to obtain one. The person sitting behind the desk in the permits and licensing office told me that they were no longer issuing public vendor licenses while the ordinance is being rewritten.

In short: you can't open a business without a license and they aren't giving out any licenses.

City Hall expects that the City Council will finish rewriting the ordinance by late August or so, but there’s no guarantee. They’ll finish rewriting it when they finish rewriting it. After all, they aren’t in business to earn a profit. Whether or not they serve their customers, they still get their customers’ money through various taxes.

I'd be willing to bet that a rich man looking to rent out a few floors in a skyscraper wouldn't be given such a runaround. Too often "pro-business" means pro-BIG business. If the city government wanted to help the economy of Atlanta then they should be enabling small business, not obstructing it.

The City Council is also mulling a ban on panhandling. I wonder if they're working on a 10-step plan to put more people on public welfare.

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I applied for my first credit card. My bank approved me for a credit line of $2500. I make about $15,000 a year waiting tables; I am budgeted down to my last dollar. When an unfortunate event occurs, such as my car breaking, it hits me hard. I might not have the money necessary to pay for it at all, even though I have a stream of income to borrow against. A credit card would help me get past the difficulty and amortize the cost over several months.

The fraud department at the card issuing company called me a few days ago. They can’t send my card to my new address because of a federal regulation. Despite the fact that I am able to give them my Social Security number, my mother’s maiden name, and the name of all the other credit cards I’ve ever applied for, they still can’t send the credit card to the address I asked them to without some proof of residence. As I am not the primary leaseholder at my new apartment, I have no proof of residence to give them.

Fortunately, they can send it to my parents’ house because they have a record of my residence there. My parents will in turn ship it to me. I only hope nothing bad happens to me or my car in the meantime while I’m waiting for the card to travel its roundabout route.

Thank you, federal government, for protecting me. From…um…something I’m sure.