The majority of small businesses across America have opted to not get their employees tested for the new coronavirus strains or get them any COVID-19 vaccines, as reported by the U.S Census Bureau.
A recent survey conducted by the U.S Census Bureau determined that 70% of small businesses do not intend on getting their employees tested for the COVID-19 before coming to work. They have no intention of ensuring that their employees have tested negative for the virus. Only 10% responded positively to getting the employees tested while others remained indifferent to the survey question.
This Small Business Pulse Survey was conducted on February 15. On average, small businesses are usually comprised of 500 or fewer employees.
The result is very interesting considering a whopping 62% of small businesses had actively participated in the survey. The sudden shift in the opinion of small businesses may be due to a decrease in the number of positive COVID-19 cases. Also, after a year, people have come to terms with it, and embraced it as ‘new normal’.
In response to a question related to contribution in capital expenditure, almost 15.6% of business owners claimed that the expenditures have decreased while 12.8% said that they had to slash a few expenditures. A quarter of the participants claimed that they had to postpone their planned business expenditures. Responding to a question, how has the COVID-19 affected their businesses, 44% of the participants claimed that it had a moderate effect on their cash flow whereas 30% held the point of view that their revenue generation was hit badly due to the coronavirus. About 19% of the business owners claimed that coronavirus had little or no effect on their small business.
Some of the small businesses have reported that the pandemic was a blessing in disguise for them, as it provided them with an opportunity to make huge profits. Though the number is less, still the online small businesses saw themselves generating healthy profits, benefitting from the grave situation. Approximately 1.7% of the respondents claimed that the COVID-19 had had a positive effect on their business while 5.6% of the respondents concluded that it had a moderately positive effect on their businesses.
Despite the vaccination process gaining momentum, the small-scale business owners are not to be blamed for opting to not get their employees vaccinated.
