UK small business job vacancies dropped 2.5% in February 2023, with 3,800 fewer job vacancies
Intuit (NASDAQ: INTU), the global financial technology platform that makes TurboTax, Credit Karma, QuickBooks, and Mailchimp, has launched the Intuit QuickBooks Small Business Index, a powerful new monthly indicator of hiring among small businesses in the UK, as well as employment in the US and Canada, developed in collaboration with leading global economist Professor Ufuk Akcigit.
The Intuit QuickBooks Small Business Index uses purpose-built economic models to normalise anonymised QuickBooks Online Payroll customer data against official government statistics to reflect the general population of small businesses in each country; it is not a reflection of Intuit’s business. This robust methodology expands Intuit’s ability to more clearly delineate between Intuit’s small business customers and the small business community at large, while also providing a powerful new tool that can inform policies that impact small businesses around the globe, as well as to help small businesses make key decisions.
The Index’s primary benefit is its unparalleled focus on small businesses, which are vital to the current and future health of the economy but often underrepresented in economic data. By shining a brighter light on small businesses with timely insights, Intuit hopes to increase small business growth and success rates throughout the UK, US and Canada.
Sasan Goodarzi, Intuit’s chief executive officer, said: “Up-to-date insights like those now available through our index will be invaluable to anyone focused on the success of small businesses, especially in the face of increasingly challenging economic conditions. We’re excited for this unique index to become a key tool economists, policymakers, and small businesses themselves can use in making decisions that will help power small business prosperity around the world.”
Fresh insights on UK small business hiring
Hiring is a bellwether for overall UK economic health and the first monthly Index reveals:
- In the UK in February, small businesses with one to nine employees had 3,800 fewer job vacancies compared to the previous month. That’s a monthly decrease of -2.5% to 150,200 job vacancies.
Fig 1: UK | Total job vacancies | Businesses with one to nine employees
- Sectors that experienced the largest drop in job vacancies in the UK were: finance and insurance (-6.88%); accommodation and food services (-5.94%); administrative and support services (-5.93%). The education sector stood out as the only sector which saw an increase in job vacancies – an increase of 1.68% to 15,900 job vacancies.
Fig 2: UK | Job vacancy growth | Businesses with one to nine employees
- Wales saw the largest decrease in the UK, with a drop of -7.35% to 5,000 job vacancies. Northern Ireland saw the smallest decrease, with a drop of -1.71% to 2,300 job vacancies.
Renowned global economist, and Arnold C. Harberger professor of economics at the University of Chicago Ufuk Akcigit said: “Intuit QuickBooks Small Business Index shows that the UK economy had -2.5% less vacancies compared to the previous month. Despite the decline, last month’s vacancy numbers are 29% higher than the pre-pandemic period. Since a peak in March 2022, there’s been a steady decline of -2.4% per month on average in job vacancies, and the most recent index shows the decline continued this month at almost the same average pace.
“Job vacancies in small businesses experienced a sharp decline starting in April 2020 due to Covid-19 and reached its minimum level in June 2020. Then the UK economy entered into a massive expansion episode for small businesses for seven consecutive quarters until March 2022. This was an important episode for small businesses where the number of vacancies increased by 4.4 times.
“The Index provides an important new perspective on the small business economy – which are critical to employment, growth and innovation in the UK. Young and small businesses are the fresh bloods that rejuvenate the UK economy by producing disproportionately more employment growth and innovation. It’s encouraging to see that vacancy numbers of firms with one to nine workers, which are closely tied to their employment levels, are well above the pre-Covid levels and small businesses are becoming an even larger part of the UK economy.”
Jolawn Victor, vice president and UK country manager, at Intuit QuickBooks, added: “We’re thrilled to provide this barometer on vacancies, so the small business community and policymakers alike have the tools to make key decisions. By protecting and nurturing small businesses now, we help them become the superstar firms of the future. What’s more, typically, the Index will have a lead time of around two weeks compared to other vacancy data – a real advantage.”
New insights published monthly
New data insights will be added to the Intuit QuickBooks Small Business Index dashboard and published in regular blog posts at the earliest opportunity every month. To subscribe, and get a full list of publication dates for 2023, visit the Intuit QuickBooks Small Business Index interactive hub.
In the UK, the Intuit QuickBooks Small Business Index shows the number of job vacancies at small businesses with one to nine employees in the previous month and how that number has changed since the month before. These data insights are available at the national (UK), country (England, Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland), and sector levels; based on a total sample of almost 25,000 businesses. Typically, the Index will be published around two weeks before the Office for National Statistics’ monthly Vacancy Survey is released.
In the US, the Index shows the number of people employed by small businesses with one to nine employees in the previous month and how that number has changed since the month before. These data insights are available at the national, regional, state (when sample sizes are sufficient), and sector levels; based on a total sample of almost 333,000 businesses. Because the Index is powered by a sample of anonymised data from QuickBooks Online Payroll, its data insights are available up to nine months earlier than equivalent official statistics, giving a more up-to-date picture of small business employment.
In Canada, the Intuit QuickBooks Small Business Index shows the number of people employed by small businesses with one to 19 employees in the previous month and how that number has changed since the month before. These data insights are available at the national, regional, and sector levels; based on a total sample of almost 66,000 businesses. Typically, the Index will be published several days before Statistics Canada’s Labour Force Survey is released.
Robust methodology
The Index methodology is robust and stands out from other reports in the market by being calibrated against official statistics and focusing exclusively on small businesses while also eliminating publication delays. Unlike other small business indexes, it does not rely exclusively on survey data. Instead, a sample of anonymised QuickBooks Online Payroll records are aggregated and normalised against official government statistics before publication using purpose-built economic models created by Professor Akcigit and his international team of independent economists. This means the Index can provide a near real-time reflection of hiring and employment in the broader small business economy — rather than trends only in the QuickBooks customer base — just a few days after small businesses run payroll.