Small Business Employment Index Reports Soft Labor Market
Intuit has recently reported its Small Business Employment Index, a study conducted over the period from September 24, 2011 to October 23, 2011. For the study, small businesses with less than 20 employees that use Intuit Online Payroll have been taken as the sample population. The research represents three categories: small business employment, compensation and number of hours worked. According to the research findings, small business employment increased by 0.14% in October and generated 30,000 new jobs. The study revealed that despite this annual growth of 1.7%, a decrease of 0.2% in number of working hours indicated that the employees are working for lesser hours and the declined in compensation by 0.06% showed less income for them. Clearly, the soft labor market indicates that the small businesses have been victim of the European economy downfall and the Greek bond default.