Steinbach business owners say the federal government's plan to remove some tax incentives will have a number of negative repercussions. The proposed tax changes would, among other things, take away the right of small business owners to split income among family members and would affect how they can save for the future.

Kent LedinghamKent Ledingham, owner of Ledingham GM, says the government has been portraying business owners as people who abuse tax breaks to avoid paying their share of taxes. But he adds the history of these tax measures has been to compensate entrepreneurs for the many challenges they have to overcome.

"Small business people do take a lot of risks. They're risking their own money and capital without the safety nets like a pension or disability or sick time. So, sometimes, some of these (tax incentives) help to offset that. And, families also participate in working at a lot of small businesses as well."

Tim Schmitt, owner of Oakleaf Promotions, agrees. He is also troubled by the way the government is portraying business people.

"When jobs need to be created and they need to move the economy of the country forward, then they rely on small businesses and entrepreneurs and make lots of 

Tim Schmitt promises about making businesses better. But now, all of sudden, entrepreneurs and business people are these villains who are stealing money and finding these tax loopholes. They're using all sorts of bad language that makes it really negative. The tax laws are set up very specifically, on purpose, as incentives to business because business is hard, business takes lots of work, it's lots of hours, it's huge risk.

Ledingham says the proposed tax changes could put a big chill into the business community and could affect things like growth and hiring.

"It can. If you have less money left in your business to reinvest, it makes it more difficult to grow and this hurts the business as well as the people who may work for them, their employees."

Schmitt notes the tax changes would have an impact long into the future.

"It's not necessarily immediate, it's more long term, long term investments that business owners are making in their businesses. And, it will affect, in years from now, how much they can save. So it's a really important thing for now and will have some effects now, but it'll have huge effects in years from now."

Ledingham says he is still hopeful the government will listen to its constituents as well as business people and work out some kind of compromise on the tax plan.