NFIB: 40% of business owners could not fill job openings in March
A new jobs report from the National Federation of Independent Businesses (NFIB) found that small businesses are still struggling to fill vacancies.
According to the report, 40% of small business owners had job openings they could not fill in March, up two percentage points since February.
Only 12% of owners planned to create new jobs in the next three months – the lowest share since April 2024, the report states. That number was down three percentage points since February.
The figures were seasonally adjusted.
Businesses cite poor labor quality as a hiring challenge, according to the report.
Connecticut saw a 26% spike in job openings during the month of January, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, with employers reporting 92,000 open positions at the end of the month.
"Connecticut’s small business owners continue to report challenges in finding qualified applicants for their open positions,” NFIB Connecticut State Director Andy Markowski said. “Many of our members say they’re struggling to hire and keep workers.”
The report says that about half (53%) of small business owners reported hiring, or trying to hire, in March. Of those, 87% reported that there were few or no qualified applicants.
The sectors with the most job openings in March were in construction, transportation and manufacturing, according to the report. The lowest were in the agriculture and wholesale sectors.
The percentage of small business owners reporting labor quality as their top operating problem was 19% in March, the same as in February.
Click here to view the full report.
Another recent NFIB report found that the increasing cost of health insurance is crippling small businesses, and that the small-group insurance market faces “an inevitable collapse.”
NFIB, an association of small businesses in the United States, advocates on behalf of its members in Washington, D.C. and in all 50 state capitals.
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