This is what a jobs bill should look like!

Hooray for the Texas legislature and Governor Rick Perry. It will now be easier for bakers to get started in a business.

People who want to sell their pies, cakes, cookies, and other baked goods may now legally operate out of their home kitchens if they sell less than $50,000 annually. The only regulations they must abide by are that the food must be labelled with the name and address of the baker, and it must carry the warning that it has not been inspected.

Professional bakeries are crying foul. No regulation means possibly contaminated food, they say. But if the food is marked with the disclaimer that it has not been inspected, the customer knows that's a possibility. And as one home baker said, "A license doesn't make a clean kitchen. And the lack of license doesn't make a dirty kitchen." Besides, most of these bakers sell their wares by word of mouth. If a friend of mine says, "I know this lady who bakes delicious cakes for sale," I'll probably go buy one. But if the baker I've never met before comes up to me and tells me she sells cakes, I probably won't buy one.

Another complaint of the professionals is that the home bakers don't have to spend the money for professional equipment, and they, therefore, have an unfair advantage over them. But the home bakers can produce only so much -- hardly enough to put a professionally equipped bakery out of business.

If a home baker doesn't have seed money for all the bells and whistles that are required for a professional set-up, she can now bake from home and save the money she needs to expand. And when she does, she will employ other people. Are you listening, Obama? Because THAT'S a true jobs bill!

"Law is icing on cake for home bakers." The Dallas Morning News; October 10, 2011; p. 1A.