Small Businesses Add 235,000 Jobs in April

The ADP National Employment Report for April shows small businesses added a whopping 235,000 jobs for the month. April’s figures continue the five-figure growth in new hires across the US by small businesses, March saw 174,000 new nonfarm hirings.

Overall the job market across the nation saw some 742,000 new hires with large businesses hiring some 277,000 new employees. While medium-sized businesses managed to hire 230,000 new employees.

“The labor market continues an upward trend of acceleration and growth, posting the strongest reading since September 2020,” said Nela Richardson, chief economist for ADP.

ADP Small Business Report April 2021

According to ADP though payrolls are still more than 8 million jobs short of pre-COVID-19 levels, job gains have totaled 1.3 million in the last two months.

Service Providers Lead Job Hiring

Of the 742,000 new job hiring in April almost a fifth (636,000) were made by the service sector. Leisure and hospitality added 237,000 new jobs last month. While trade, transport and utilities also absorbed new hires by offering up 155,000 new jobs. They are closely followed by professional businesses that managed to hire some 104,000 new employees. Only information service providers from this sector saw negative growth during April with businesses seeing job losses of 3,000.

This is even more pronounced when it comes to small businesses engaged in the service sector. Of the 235,000 new jobs, small service providers hired 221,000 new employees. This is because service providers have the most to gain as the economy reopens, recovers, and resumes normal activities.

Franchises

Franchises also saw an uptick in hiring with 49,600 new hires in April, up from just 15,500 in March.  With restaurants and auto parts and car dealers hiring 47,100 new employees. In April job losses were also reported among food retailers and business services. Food retailers had to cut 1,000 jobs while business services providers saw some 2,100 job losses.

Strong Job Market for Small Businesses

During the past month businesses with less than 20 employees added 122,000 new jobs- up from 100,000 in March. While businesses with less than 50 employees hired 113,000 new employees compared to the 74,000 hired the previous month.

Though the service sector had hired the most employees, businesses in the good producing sector also saw modest growth of 14,000 new jobs which is up by 3,000 new jobs from the figures in March.

Image: ADP

This article, "Small Businesses Add 235,000 Jobs in April" was first published on Small Business Trends