• Minimum Wage Bill's Impact on Small Business
• ApparelWholesale.Biz Opens!
• New & Featured Vendors In GiftsWholesale.Com
• Major Trade Shows
  

ApparelWholesale.Biz Opens!

A new OmegaNet Portal is open geared to retailers who carry apparel and jewelry. ApparelWholesale.Biz is like OmegaNet's other portals, GiftsWholesale.Com, AccessoriesWholesale.Com, DecorWholesale.Com and ToysWholesale.Com, in that it carries links and advertising from a variety of wholesalers. Many of these wholesalers have CAMEO EZ web sites where you can copy your GiftsWholesale.Com registration to gain entry and place wholesale orders. Some will require separate registration, but all are wholesale to the trade.

The new portal has a page called "News and Trends" which displays news about Women's Fashions.

Featured Vendors in GiftsWholesale.Com
indicates a CAMEO EZ© web site.

Art Glass Imports provides retailers and distributors with reasonably-priced, high-quality gift items. From our gorgeous Designer Collection Perfume Bottles to our incredible Oil Lamps, our imported glass artwork will increase your sales due to their high demand.

Hansen's Christmas Stuff : Everything you will need to make your Christmas season merry and bright as well as Gnomy's Diaries by Annekabouke. Two sites: US and Canadian.

Magnolia Lane Collection: A leading distributer of handpainted ceramic collections like NFL, College, Kids, Wedding, Birthday, Christmas, Everyday and the extremely popular "Make it Personal" line. The whimsical table top designs are a must have.

Mud Pie: Mud Pie products are now featured in three catalogs: Mud Pie Baby, Mud Pie Gift, and Mud Pie Pet. It has always been our goal to offer innovative giftware that's affordably priced and adorably packaged.

Spring Street is proud to offer the finest assortment of personal, home, and office accessories. Our extensive product lines are all theme oriented, from baby to bride and beyond. All of our gift items are hand epoxy enameled and adorned with faux jewel encrusted motifs. Many of our designs are inspired from the famed Soho district of New York City where the very real Spring Street is located.

Sunset Vista Designs: From the same creative team that brought you Care and Wonder Company; We're back with a fresh new line of the latest in home and garden decor.

Small Business Impact Debated in Minimum Wage Bill
(from press and government reports)

On March 15, the U.S House of Representatives Committee on Appropriations approved a supplemental spending bill for the Iraq war which includes the proposed federal minimum wage increase and tax breaks.

The House and Senate both passed Minimum Wage bills in February that are very similar, except for the amount of tax breaks offered to small businesses. The House's tax cuts over 10 years would total $1.8 billion; the Senate's $8.3 billion.

The that that there is a new Democrat majority in both Houses of Congress has made the debate over the increase in the Minimum Wage more heated, with Republicans and President Bush eager to give small businesses tax breaks to ease the burden of increased wages, while Democrats insist that every tax dollar lost to a new tax break be offset by a tax increase or closed loophole elsewhere.

On February 16, the House of Representatives voted 360-45 to pass a $1.4 billion package of small-business tax cuts which should help to ease the passage of the federal minimum wage increase in the Senate. Now the House and Senate must work together to craft a bill that will pass both arms of the legislative branch - but they've overcome the biggest hurdle since President Bush favors a federal minimum wage bill that includes tax breaks for small businesses.

The House passage came on the heels February 1 of a 94-3 vote in the U.S. Senate to increase the minimum wage from $5.15 to $7.25 over a two year span. In the Senate, where the Democrat majority is one seat, the bill included tax breaks for small businesses. In January, in a 54 to 43 vote, the Senate struck down the bill to increase in the Federal minimum wage citing, the bill's failure to include tax cuts for businesses that employee minimum wage workers.

The new wage rate of $7.25 an hour is more than 6.6 million Americans currently make; five percent of the workforce. These workers would be directly affected by the new minimum wage. An additional 8.3 million workers (6% of the country's workers) earning slightly above the new minimum would also likely see their wages go up due to upward pressure from the new rate.