The 51 percent majority of the nation's small businesses are pessimistic about when, if ever, their operations will recover from the coronavirus pandemic—the highest level in nearly a year, according to the Census Bureau's Small Business Pulse Survey fielded January 10-16, 2022. The last time so many small businesses were this pessimistic about their future was nearly a year ago in late February/early March of 2021.
Among the 51 percent of small businesses with a gloomy outlook, 38 percent say it will be at least 6 months before their operations return to what they were before the pandemic. Another 12 percent say their operations will never return to normal, and 1 percent say they have closed down. Omicron seems to have convinced a record share of small businesses that the pre-pandemic normal is gone forever. The percentage of small businesses that say their operations will never return to pre-pandemic levels had been in the single digits during most of the pandemic. The share climbed to 12 percent in early December 2021 and has been at that level ever since.
The Census Bureau has been asking small businesses about their expectations nearly every week since April 26-May 2, 2020. Small business pessimism peaked at 56.6 percent in August 2020. Pessimism began to recede as Covid vaccines became widely available in the spring of 2021, falling to a low of 40.0 percent in June 2021. But the delta and then the omicron variants have driven pessimism back up above the 50 percent mark.
No comments:
Post a Comment