Layoffs & Hiring Freezes Surge: 15% of SMB Employers Reduce Staff & 74% Halt Hiring, Report Says

Large corporations aren't the only businesses seeing an increase in layoffs right now. Due to fears of recession, reduced revenues, and ongoing struggles with high inflation and labor costs, there's now a surge in layoffs among small businesses, too, along with a significant jump in the percentage instituting hiring freezes. 

The percentage of small business employers now laying off staffers has nearly doubled in one month's time, going from 8% in November to 15% in December. 

Beyond that, nearly three out of four small business employers (74%) say they can't afford to hire anyone now, and don't expect to hire again until at least Q2 2023. That finding is up 12 percentage points over last month's number: 62%. 

The current economic landscape is fueling these surges. Three more statistics illustrate the challenge: 

• Only 14% of small businesses open prior to COVID have fully recovered, making as much if not more monthly than they generated prior to the pandemic. 
• This is down 10 percentage points from 24% in October, which was already low. Even worse, the recovery rate is down 29 percentage points from Dec. 2021, when it hit a high of 43%.
• 61% of all small business owners tell us inflation continues to have a "very negative impact"on their financial well-being.

All of these data insights are part of Alignable's December Hiring Report, released today. It's based on the sentiments expressed by 6,908 randomly selected small business owners, polled from November 19, 2022 through December 8, 2022. And it includes another 100,000+ historical responses from surveys conducted over the past two years.

Some 87% of employers participating in this poll have fewer than 20 employees, and 77% have 10 or less, representing the true heart of small business -- diligent, dedicated Mom & Pop operations across the United States and Canada.