Small business owners and employees have been less sanguine about a delay in fiscal spending than stock traders.
Driving the news: A new survey from Alignable finds that many small businesses are growing more worried about "a severe cash crunch," with 42% saying they could collapse by the end of the fourth quarter.
- Small business owners' top concern was that they would completely run out of financial reserves.
- 45% of all small businesses have earned 50% or less of their pre-pandemic revenue — eight months into the pandemic.
- When asked what would help them the most right now, 35% said reducing the COVID-19 case levels to increase consumer confidence.
Heads up: Goldman Sachs economists estimate that winter weather will reduce total restaurant spending by 3%–4% and consumption by 0.2 percentage points.
- This translates to a 0.3 percentage point hit to real GDP growth in Q4 and a 0.1 percentage point hit in Q1 next year, followed by a rebound as temperatures rise.