The latest monthly survey on small business job growth by Paychex and the research firm IHS shows a decline in that growth but an increase in wages.
That’s a trend that Paychex CEO Martin Mucci says this survey has seen over the last few months.
June marked four consecutive months of decline nationwide in small business job growth, but national hourly wages were up nearly there percent compared to a year ago.
Mucci says one reason a lot of businesses may not be adding jobs right now, may be due to questions over what will happen to proposed regulatory reform in Washington.
“There is this uncertainty in the administration right now, things that are most important to small businesses in particular, health care reform, tax reform , immigration, things like that are all unsettled right now, they’re not sure what’s going to happen, if anything,” Mucci told WXXI News.
Mucci says that another reason for the pace of job growth declining is that the U.S. is getting close to full employment. And he says that’s also putting upward pressure on wages.
The survey also shows that among individual states, New York ranked at the bottom.
“New York has always been a little bit on the low end, I think, probably when you think about it from a tax perspective; there’s not as much construction here, construction was down year-over-year in new York; where it’s still strong pretty much in the South and in Florida and in Georgia in particular.”
In terms of sectors in the economy, Mucci says that sales of new homes have impacted the numbers.
“Construction is down a bit, and I think sales of new homes are up, but much lower than they were and I think people are spending more on kind of the Home Depot type of repair, versus buying a new home.”
