MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. — Small-business job growth continued in April, according to the Intuit Inc. Small Business Employment Index. Employees also worked longer hours and earned more money.
Small businesses added 60,000 new jobs last month, for a monthly growth rate of 0.3% and an annualized growth rate of nearly 3.6%.
“Small business employment is showing continued strength,” says Susan Woodward, an economist who worked with Intuit to create the index. “Employment is up, hours worked are up, and total compensation per employee is up.
“Moreover, employment is up across the country,” she says. “While we have a long way to go to full employment, we have seen continued improvement now for a year-and-a-half.”
Based on Intuit’s latest data, employment growth in March was revised upward to 0.3%, or 65,000 new jobs. Small businesses have created 845,000 jobs since October 2009, the company says.
Hourly employees worked an average of 109.8 hours in April, or 0.7% more than the March figure of 109.0 hours. “This is a good sign,” Woodward says. “The U.S. has 8.4 million part-time employees who would be happy to work more hours.”
Average monthly pay for all small-business employees was $2,653 in April, up 0.5% from March’s $2,641 per month. “Compensation per employee rose in April, continuing a slight upward trend that began about six months ago,” Woodward says.
“This upward trend is partly due to hourly employees working more hours while hourly wages remain flat. So despite this slight rise in compensation, the small-business labor market is still soft, and employers have room to hire without pushing wages up.”
Intuit culls data from approximately 65,000 client businesses for the index, which covers approximately 170,000 hourly employees. While the index is not necessarily representative of all small businesses, the month-to-month changes it shows parallel federal employment data.
Intuit Inc. is the maker of QuickBooks, Quicken, TurboTax and additional management, payroll and tax-preparation software. For more information, visit www.intuit.com.
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