Founder Data ReportTwo Years Into the Pandemic, 12.2% of Small Employers Said They Would Never Get Back to Normal. In 2020 It Was 7.4%
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For two years the Census Bureau asked small employers, in weekly survey rounds, how long it would take to get back to normal. The share answering never did not shrink. It grew.
In the U.S. Census Bureau’s Small Business Pulse Survey, the share of small employers saying they did not believe their business would ever return to its normal level of operations held at about 7.4% from August 2020 through July 2021. It then rose, to 10.4% in August to October 2021 and 12.2% in February to April 2022. At firms with one to four employees it reached 14.3%. By then 21.6% said they were back to normal.
- Answering never: 7.4% in August to October 2020 and still 7.4% in May to July 2021, then 10.4%, 12.0% and 12.2% over the next three survey phases.
- Back to normal: 10.1% in August to October 2020, 21.6% in February to April 2022.
- More than six months away: 46.1% at the peak, in November 2020 to January 2021; 32.0% in February to April 2022.
- Firms with one to four employees answered never more often than firms with 20 or more in every phase: 14.3% against 9.9% at the end.
- The survey covers single-location employers with 1 to 499 employees, and cannot say why the answers moved.
Two years of the same question
From April 2020 to April 2022 the Census Bureau ran the Small Business Pulse Survey, a short weekly questionnaire sent to nonfarm, single-location employer businesses with 1 to 499 employees. In every round it asked a version of the same question: how much time do you think will pass before this business returns to its normal level of operations? From August 2020 the answers ran from one month or less to more than six months, plus four others: the business had already returned, there had been little or no effect, the owner did not believe it would ever return to normal, or it had closed for good.
The survey ran in phases of nine weekly rounds, each round going to one of nine slices of its sample. Averaging a whole phase covers all nine.Through the first four of those phases, from August 2020 to July 2021, the share of owners answering never barely moved: 7.4%, 7.4%, 7.5%, 7.4%. Then it climbed. In August to October 2021 it was 10.4%. By February to April 2022, two years after the survey began, it was 12.2%, about one small employer in eight.
Each point is the average of the nine weekly rounds in one survey phase, labelled by the month the phase began. Phases 2 and 3 asked about normal operations ‘relative to one year ago’; later phases dropped those words, and the share did not move at that change. The first phase, spring 2020, used a shorter answer list and is not shown.
U.S. Census Bureau, Small Business Pulse Survey, weekly national and employment-size files, rounds of August 9, 2020 to April 17, 2022; retrieved October 26, 2026. Each value is the average of the nine weekly rounds in a survey phase.
More owners back to normal, and more who no longer expected it
Over the same two years, more owners got there. The share saying the business had already returned to normal went from 10.1% in August to October 2020 to 21.6% in February to April 2022. The share putting normal more than six months away peaked at 46.1% in November 2020 to January 2021 and was down to 32.0% by the end.
Among the owners still waiting, the outlook stayed long the whole way through. Leave out the firms that were back to normal, had seen little effect, or had closed, and in every phase from August 2020 on between 66% and 81% of the rest put normal more than six months away or said it would never come. In the final phase it was 77%.
Share of small employers giving each answer, average of the final nine weekly rounds. ‘Back within six months’ combines one month or less, two to three months and four to six months. Bars on a 0 to 40% scale; the permanently-closed bar is drawn at the minimum width so it stays visible.
U.S. Census Bureau, Small Business Pulse Survey, weekly national and employment-size files, rounds of August 9, 2020 to April 17, 2022; retrieved October 26, 2026. Each value is the average of the nine weekly rounds in a survey phase.
The share saying never did not shrink as the months went by. It held for a year, then grew.
The smallest firms said never most often
The survey also published every answer by employment size. In every phase from August 2020 to April 2022, firms with one to four employees said never more often than firms with 20 or more. In August to October 2020 it was 9.0% against 6.1%. By February to April 2022 it was 14.3% against 9.9%, with firms of five to 19 employees in between at 12.0%. All three groups were higher at the end than at the start.
That is not the same as the smallest firms being further from normal on every measure. Firms with one to four employees were less likely than firms with 20 or more to put normal more than six months away (28.6% against 35.5% in the final phase). Among the smallest, more of the long-wait answers were never.
Small employers: nonfarm, single-location businesses with 1 to 499 employees. Each value is a phase average of nine weekly rounds. The track runs from 0 to 20%.
U.S. Census Bureau, Small Business Pulse Survey, weekly national and employment-size files, rounds of August 9, 2020 to April 17, 2022; retrieved October 26, 2026. Each value is the average of the nine weekly rounds in a survey phase.
What to take from this if you run a small one
A shock does not end on one date for every business. Two years in, about one owner in five said the business was back to normal, and about one in eight said it never would be. The survey does not say what those owners did next. For an owner it is worth asking the question the Census Bureau asked, and answering it honestly: when will this business be back to its normal level, or is the old normal the wrong thing to wait for? The plans for those two answers are different.
Three limits worth holding. The survey cannot say why the share answering never rose when it did. The rise came in the August to October 2021 phase, the same phase in which the Census Bureau began leaving out businesses whose payroll tax account had gone inactive, and the published figures cannot separate the two. It covers single-location employers with 1 to 499 employees, so owners with no employees and chains are outside it. And each answer is the owner’s own view of the business, not a measure of its sales or staff.
U.S. Census Bureau, Small Business Pulse Survey.
Frequently Asked Questions
How many small businesses thought they would never get back to normal after COVID?
In the Census Bureau's Small Business Pulse Survey, 12.2% of small employers said in February to April 2022 that they did not believe the business would ever return to its normal level of operations, up from about 7.4% from August 2020 to July 2021.
How many small businesses said they were back to normal two years into the pandemic?
21.6% in February to April 2022, up from 10.1% in August to October 2020. Another 19.7% said there had been little or no effect on the business.
Were the smallest businesses more likely to say they would never get back to normal?
Yes. Firms with one to four employees answered never more often than firms with 20 or more in every survey phase from August 2020 to April 2022: 14.3% against 9.9% at the end.
When did the share answering never start to rise?
It held at about 7.4% from August 2020 to July 2021, then rose to 10.4% in August to October 2021. The survey does not say why.
Where does the data come from?
The U.S. Census Bureau's Small Business Pulse Survey, a weekly survey of nonfarm, single-location employer businesses with 1 to 499 employees that ran from April 2020 to April 2022. Figures here are averages of the nine weekly rounds in each survey phase.
Published by The Lonely Entrepreneur — the community and coaching platform for entrepreneurs who are building alone. lonelyentrepreneur.com
This article is for educational purposes and is not a substitute for professional financial or legal advice.