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California is in a sort of "slow motion" economic recovery, with employment up but with many of the new jobs offering lower pay than in the past, according to a study of payroll records of small businesses by SurePayroll, a payroll processing company located in Skokie, Ill.
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In California, the average small business saw its employment in September up 5.7 percent for the year, according to SurePayroll's figures.

But average salaries are down 5.9 percent, it says. California follows the national trend in this respect -- more people are getting jobs at small businesses, but the jobs are not paying as well as they used to pay.

Nationally, in third quarter 2004, small business headcount grew by 1.46 percent, with the average small business weighing in at 5.6 employees, according to the company's figures.

"That was a nice improvement from what we saw in second quarter 2004, when small business headcount grew by 0.97 percent, with the average small business weighing in at 5.5 employees," says Michael Alter, president of SurePayroll.

On an annualized basis, 1.46 percent quarterly growth equates to 5.95 percent annual growth. In simple terms, at this growth rate, if the local business around the corner from you had 17 employees today, they'd have 18 employees a year from now, Mr. Alter explains.

"While it's nice to see quarter over quarter improvement, the data suggests we've got a slow motion recovery on our hands. Things are still getting better but not at the pace we'd like to see," he says. "My conversations with our customers confirm what the data is telling me. The small business owners I talk to say things like "We're in cautious growth mode' and 'I'm waiting to see if things are really picking up.'"

Copyright © 2004. San Jose Business Journal.