Report: Record 63% of small businesses freeze hiring | Eastern North Carolina Now

    Publisher's Note: This post appears here courtesy of the John Locke Foundation. The author of this post is Brian Balfour.

    Troubling economic news continues to pile up.

    As reported yesterday by The Center Square, a new survey of small businesses finds 63% are putting hiring on hold "because they can't afford to add staff." Ten percent of that group are reporting that they are laying off workers.

    Moreover, the report found that in August, "51% of all small businesses generated half or less of their pre-COVID monthly earnings." That half of small businesses have still not recovered to pre-Covid earnings is very troubling news.

    Even more troubling are the findings from a July survey that said nearly half (47%) of small businesses "say their businesses are at risk of closing by fall 2022, unless economic conditions improve significantly."

    Rising inflation and an inability to afford rising labor costs were cited as primary reasons for the struggles of small businesses.

    Joe Biden's twitter account recently had to delete a tweet bragging about our current "economic recovery," likely because it would appear so out of touch with reality.

    The nation may already be in a recession, and the warning signs are mounting that the economy is heading for very tough times.

    Fortunately, conservative budget-writers in North Carolina's legislature have been aggressively using massive surpluses to shore up the state's Rainy Day Fund, making our state well-equipped to weather the coming economic storm.