(Fortune Small Business) — The good news: The economy is not as bad as it was in the early 1980s, when unemployment hit 10% and the inflation rate touched the double digits. The bad news: A lot of small business owners think it is.
Pessimism about the economy among small-business owners has reached lows similar to those experienced from 1980 to 1982, the nadir of the worst recession in modern economic history, according to the latest installment of Small Business Economic Trends Report by the National Federation of Independent Businesses (NFIB), often dubbed “the optimism index.” The current optimism index is 89.2, the lowest since 1986.
“Clearly, conditions aren’t good,” said William Dennis, senior research fellow at the NFIB Research Foundation, of the current economy. “But there’s a considerable difference between the conditions themselves [in 1980 versus 2008]. It was much, much worse in 1980. What sent the index down really has to do with just a general mood.”
Rising gas prices, the subprime lending crisis, and repeated federal bailouts of struggling financial giants have exacerbated that mood, as political candidates and the media focus on the widespread economic distress.
The slumping economy’s affect on small businesses is reflected in several key statistics from the NFIB’s latest Small Business Poll, which was released on Monday.
Forty-four percent of small-business owners surveyed said they’re spending more time working for their business than they did six months ago, with 41% attributing the extra workload to a slowing economy. But 10% of respondents said…
