WASHINGTON, D.C. (April 5, 2024) – NFIB Research Center Executive Director Holly Wade joined Bloomberg: The Close to discuss the small business labor market and hiring trends.
Wade shares insights from NFIB’s March jobs report to highlight the state of the labor market on Main Street, and the outlook for small business hiring and compensation over the coming months.
Watch Wade’s full interview here. The segment begins at the 24:15 minute-mark: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/videos/2024-04-04/bloomberg-markets-the-close-04-04-2024-video
“On the small business side, it’s been kind of a rocky road for a lot of small business owners, depending on the industry that they’re in. Right now, labor pressures have eased a bit from their peak in 2022, certainly. But we’re still finding…about 18% saying that their single most important problem is labor quality, and another 10% saying it’s labor costs. So, for over a quarter, their main concern in operating their business is labor related.
“We have seen, over the last four months, a decline in those reporting that they are planning to hire in the next quarter. That’s been receding quite a bit…We’re now back down, as far as hiring plans [go], to [what they were in] 2016. So, it’s a long way off from where we were [during the pandemic]. But those unfilled job openings are still at a very high level, even though they are also off their peak.
“When we ask our members about whether they’re increasing, decreasing, or maintaining the same compensation in the last quarter compared to the previous one, still high levels of [owners are] reporting that they are increasing compensation or that they are planning to increase compensation in the next three months. So, those levels are still historically high.”
