Many believe small businesses have been holding off on hiring full-time workers because they fear another dip in the economy, instead turning to part-time or temporary workers to fill roles in the meantime, Crain's Cleveland Business explains.
But the hard data tells a different story. In the 33 months since the recovery began from the most recent recession, small employers added 2.6 million jobs – a 2.9 percent increase in employment, the news source states. Compare that to the pace of recovery from the 2001 post-dot-com recessionary period (1.8 million jobs over that same timeframe), and it seems businesses are recovering quicker now.
However, that's still not the perception.
"Since the recovery began, small and midsize companies have been producing more jobs than their larger counterparts and creating them at a faster pace than during the recovery from the 2001 recession," said Scott Shane, the A. Malachi Mixon III professor of entrepreneurial studies at Case Western Reserve University, as quoted by the news source. "But because small business employment hasn't yet caught up to where it was before the recession began, the perception that small employers aren't hiring endures."
A recent Kauffman Foundation report adds that startups have dropped from 49 percent in 1982 to 35 percent in 2010, further hindering America's ability to create jobs.
