--- url: 'https://lonelyentrepreneur.com/founder-the-big-firm-answer/' title: '8.6% of Finance Employers Name Managing Staff at Home as the Obstacle. In Retail, 3.0% Do — and They Employ 21.4% of the Workers.' author: name: Samantha Lankford url: 'https://lonelyentrepreneur.com/author/sam/' date: '2026-10-05T10:30:00-04:00' modified: '2026-10-05T10:30:00-04:00' type: post summary: 'Census asked employers what limits remote work. Finance named managing staff at home most, at 8.6%. In most trades, the bigger firms are the ones saying it.' categories: - Blog Post image: 'https://lonelyentrepreneur.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/founder-the-big-firm-answer-hero.webp' published: true --- # 8.6% of Finance Employers Name Managing Staff at Home as the Obstacle. In Retail, 3.0% Do — and They Employ 21.4% of the Workers. ![The Lonely Entrepreneur](https://lonelyentrepreneur.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/TLE_Logo_mobile-490W-26-26.png)Founder Data Report ![8.6% of Finance Employers Name Managing Staff at Home as the Obstacle. In Retail, 3.0% Do — and They Employ 21.4% of the Workers.](https://lonelyentrepreneur.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/founder-the-big-firm-answer-hero.webp) Founder Data Report # 8.6% of Finance Employers Name Managing Staff at Home as the Obstacle. In Retail, 3.0% Do — and They Employ 21.4% of the Workers. By Michael Dermer • Updated October 5, 2026 Get clarity — download the free Entrepreneur Survival Guide Summary. [Download the Survival Guide →](https://lonelyentrepreneur.com/esg-overview/?utm_source=blog-cta) Nationally, 4% of employers say managing people who work from home is what holds remote work back. Split by trade, the answer changes six-fold — and inside most trades it is coming from the biggest firms. Quick Answer When the Census Bureau asked employers what limits working from home, the answer *management of employees too costly or complicated* came from **8.6%** of finance and insurance firms — the highest of any precisely measured trade — and from **1.3%** in accommodation and food services, 6.6 times less. But the bigger finding is who inside each trade gives that answer. In 17 of the 18 trades with a published figure, the firms naming management employ a larger share of the trade’s workers than their share of its firms. In retail they are 3.0% of firms and employ **21.4%** of the workers. Finance is the one trade where it is not a big-firm answer. The 30-second version - Nationally, 4.0% of answering employer firms name managing staff at home as a limit on remote work. By trade it runs from 8.6% in finance and insurance to 1.3% in accommodation and food services. - Finance sits clearly above the next two, professional services (6.3%) and wholesale (6.2%). Management of companies reads 10.2%, but its error is too wide to rank. - In 17 of 18 trades, the firms giving the management answer employ more than their share of workers — at the median, 3.2 times their share of firms. - Retail is the extreme: 3.0% of firms, 21.4% of employees, 7.3 times. The retailers saying it average 279 employees. - Finance runs the other way (8.6% of firms, 7.7% of employees): the firms saying it are no bigger than the trade’s average. ## The trade sets how often the question even comes up The Annual Business Survey gave employers five answers to the question of what limits working from home, and let them pick more than one. Nationally, 4.0% chose *management of employees too costly or complicated*. Split by trade, that answer ranges six-fold. Finance and insurance gives it most often among the trades the survey measures tightly, at 8.6% — clearly above professional and technical services at 6.3% and wholesale at 6.2%, which are level with each other. At the bottom, accommodation and food services (1.3%), other services (1.5%) and arts and recreation (1.7%) are too close to call among themselves. These are the trades where the work mostly cannot leave the building, so the management question rarely gets the chance to arise. The Data Share of employer firms naming ‘management of employees too costly or complicated’ as a limit on working from home, by trade Management of companies11,105 firms answered · ±4.1 pts10.2%Finance and insurance132,608 firms answered8.6%Professional and technicalservices509,661 firms answered6.3%Wholesale trade145,335 firms answered6.2%Manufacturing127,314 firms answered · ±2.0 pts5.8%Information38,763 firms answered4.4%Utilities1,974 firms answered · ±2.7 pts3.9%Administrative and wasteservices178,316 firms answered3.9%Mining, oil and gas8,516 firms answered · ±1.5 pts3.8%Transportation andwarehousing92,760 firms answered3.7%Construction376,959 firms answered3.5%Health care and socialassistance337,479 firms answered3.4%Retail trade271,531 firms answered3.0%Real estate, rental andleasing178,272 firms answered2.8%Educational services38,189 firms answered2.2%Arts, entertainment andrecreation59,519 firms answered1.7%Other services187,277 firms answered1.5%Accommodation and foodservices223,827 firms answered1.3% Bars share one scale, set by the largest value. Slate bars (management of companies; manufacturing; utilities; mining, oil and gas) carry a standard error of 1.5 points or more, printed under each, and should be read as approximate. Agriculture’s figure is suppressed by the Bureau and is not shown. Firms could give more than one answer. U.S. Census Bureau, Annual Business Survey 2023, Characteristics of Businesses (AB2300CSCB01), question FACWHOME by 2022 NAICS sector, employer firms, released January 2026. Shares are of firms in each sector that answered the question; nationally that is about 49% of the 5,934,950 employer firms in scope. > In retail, 3.0% of employers named managing staff at home. They employ 21.4% of the workers. ## Inside most trades, it is the big firms saying it Count employees rather than firms and the answer moves in almost every trade. The Census file attaches to each answer the total employment of the firms that gave it, so the employee share shows how large those firms are compared with the rest of their trade. In 17 of 18 trades, the firms naming management hold a bigger share of the workers than of the firms. In retail, 3.0% of answering firms employ 21.4% of the workers at answering retailers — the retailers saying it average 279 employees, against 38 for every retailer that answered. Transportation and warehousing runs the same way: 3.7% of firms, 22.6% of employees. Those are firms the size of chains and fleets — businesses large enough to have a layer of managers between the owner and the work. That layer is where the difficulty appears to arrive. The Data The management answer, counted by firms and by the employees at those firms Finance and insurance Share of firms8.6% Share of employees at those firms7.7% Professional and technical services Share of firms6.3% Share of employees at those firms8.9% Wholesale trade Share of firms6.2% Share of employees at those firms12.7% Manufacturing Share of firms5.8% Share of employees at those firms12.3% Information Share of firms4.4% Share of employees at those firms14.7% Transportation and warehousing Share of firms3.7% Share of employees at those firms22.6% Retail trade Share of firms3.0% Share of employees at those firms21.4% Accommodation and food services Share of firms1.3% Share of employees at those firms6.3% Slate is the share of answering firms in the trade giving the management answer; orange is the share of the trade’s employees who work at those firms — everyone on their payroll, not only the people whose jobs are affected. Eight trades shown; both bars use one scale. Finance is the only trade where orange is shorter. U.S. Census Bureau, Annual Business Survey 2023, Characteristics of Businesses (AB2300CSCB01), question FACWHOME by 2022 NAICS sector, employer firms, released January 2026. Shares are of firms in each sector that answered the question; nationally that is about 49% of the 5,934,950 employer firms in scope. ## Finance is the exception, and remote-friendly work does not explain it Finance and insurance is the one trade where the management answer is not a big-firm answer: 8.6% of firms, 7.7% of employees. The finance firms giving it are, on average, no bigger than the trade’s other answering firms. It would be tidy to say the answer simply shows up wherever the work could go home — finance is where the job is least often tied to the building, with only 28.9% saying it cannot be done at home. But real estate breaks that story. Only 37.7% of real-estate firms say the job cannot be done at home, yet just 2.8% name management — a gap the survey’s error cannot close. Across all 18 trades, the link between the two answers is weak. Something about the work in finance, not just its location, makes remote management harder to sign off on. The Data How much bigger are the firms naming management? Their employee share divided by their firm share Retail trade3.0% of firms · 21.4% ofemployees7.3xEducational services2.2% of firms · 13.6% ofemployees6.2xTransportation andwarehousing3.7% of firms · 22.6% ofemployees6.2xAccommodation and foodservices1.3% of firms · 6.3% of employees4.8xArts, entertainment andrecreation1.7% of firms · 6.8% of employees3.9xConstruction3.5% of firms · 12.3% ofemployees3.5xOther services1.5% of firms · 5.1% of employees3.4xUtilities3.9% of firms · 13.1% ofemployees3.4xInformation4.4% of firms · 14.7% ofemployees3.4xMining, oil and gas3.8% of firms · 12.0% ofemployees3.1xReal estate, rental andleasing2.8% of firms · 8.7% of employees3.1xAdministrative and wasteservices3.9% of firms · 11.5% ofemployees2.9xHealth care and socialassistance3.4% of firms · 7.4% of employees2.2xManufacturing5.8% of firms · 12.3% ofemployees2.1xWholesale trade6.2% of firms · 12.7% ofemployees2.0xProfessional and technicalservices6.3% of firms · 8.9% of employees1.4xManagement of companies10.2% of firms · 12.4% ofemployees1.2xFinance and insurance8.6% of firms · 7.7% of employees0.9x 1.0x would mean the firms giving the management answer are the same size, on average, as every answering firm in their trade. 11 of 18 trades sit at 3x or more. Finance (slate) is the only trade below 1.0x. The ratio is built from published firm and employment counts; the Bureau publishes no standard error for it, so treat small differences as unranked. U.S. Census Bureau, Annual Business Survey 2023, Characteristics of Businesses (AB2300CSCB01), question FACWHOME by 2022 NAICS sector, employer firms, released January 2026. Shares are of firms in each sector that answered the question; nationally that is about 49% of the 5,934,950 employer firms in scope. ## What to do with this if you run a small business If you are holding work in the building because you doubt you can manage it from a distance, the trade you are in shapes how unusual that is. In finance, roughly one employer in twelve gives that answer, small or large. In most other trades it is an answer that grows with the payroll — the retailers giving it average 279 people. For a small owner that is worth separating out: a doubt that belongs to a company with several layers of supervision may not be your constraint yet. The decision to settle early is how work gets checked, because that is what gets harder as the headcount grows — whether or not anyone ever works from home. Four limits worth holding. The survey covers **employer firms only**. Only about **49% of employer firms answered** this question, and every share here is of the firms in each trade that answered. The question is **multiple response** in every trade, so no answer can be read as ‘everyone else’. And the employee figures count **everyone at a firm** giving the answer, which is what makes them a reading of firm size rather than of how many workers are affected. The Data Where the numbers land 8.6% of answering finance and insurance employers name managing staff at home as a limit 1.3% of answering accommodation and food-service employers give the same answer 17 of 18 trades where the firms giving it employ more than their share of workers 7.3x retail: 21.4% of employees at 3.0% of firms U.S. Census Bureau, Annual Business Survey 2023, Characteristics of Businesses (AB2300CSCB01), question FACWHOME, answer ‘management of employees too costly or complicated’. ## Frequently Asked Questions Which industries find remote employees hardest to manage? In the Census Bureau's Annual Business Survey 2023, finance and insurance had the highest precisely measured share of employer firms naming 'management of employees too costly or complicated' as a limit on working from home, at 8.6%. Professional and technical services (6.3%) and wholesale (6.2%) followed. Management of companies read 10.2% with a wide error. Which industries name it least? Accommodation and food services (1.3%), other services (1.5%) and arts, entertainment and recreation (1.7%). The three are within the survey's margin of error of one another. Is managing remote staff mainly a big-company concern? In most trades, yes. In 17 of the 18 trades with a published figure, the firms giving the management answer employ a larger share of workers than their share of firms. In retail they are 3.0% of firms and employ 21.4% of workers. Finance and insurance is the exception, at 8.6% of firms and 7.7% of employees. Do industries where work can be done from home name management more often? Only loosely. Finance, where the fewest firms say the job cannot be done at home, names management most often among the precisely measured trades. But real estate, where only 37.7% say the job cannot be done at home, names it at 2.8%. Across trades the relationship is weak. What does the employee share mean here? It is the share of a trade's employees who work at firms giving the answer — all of those firms' employees, not only the people whose jobs could be done at home. Because it counts whole payrolls, it shows how large the answering firms are compared with the rest of their trade. Keep reading - [Only 4.0% of Employers Say Managing People at Home Is the Problem. 60.1% Say the Work Can’t Leave the Building.](https://lonelyentrepreneur.com/founder-the-work-not-the-worker/) - [In Real Estate, 1.2% of Workplaces Hold 32.7% of the Jobs. In Manufacturing, 16.7% Hold 80.2%.](https://lonelyentrepreneur.com/founder-who-holds-the-jobs-in-your-trade/) - [A Third of American Employer Businesses Pay People Who Are Not on Their Payroll. Almost One in Five Has No Full-Time Employee.](https://lonelyentrepreneur.com/founder-who-else-does-the-work/) Part of the entrepreneurial struggle: [Trust Gap](https://lonelyentrepreneur.com/entrepreneur-struggle/trust/) ![The Lonely Entrepreneur](https://lonelyentrepreneur.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/TLE_Logo_mobile-490W-26-26.png) Published by **The Lonely Entrepreneur** — the community and coaching platform for entrepreneurs who are building alone. [lonelyentrepreneur.com](https://lonelyentrepreneur.com/) This article is for educational purposes and is not a substitute for professional financial or legal advice.