Jobs Update, Employees Seek Financial Guidance, Teaching Entrepreneurship

Hey everybody, it's Gene Marks and welcome to this week's episode of the Paychex THRIVE Week in Review. Thank you so much for joining us. This is the podcast and video podcast where we take a few items of news that affects your small business and mine and we talk about it a little bit. So, let's get right to it.

The big items of news in this past week has been jobs. There are lots of jobs numbers coming out of there and the news is really not so great. I will start with Paychex, as in Small Business Employment Watch, which comes out every month. According to the Paychex Small Business Employment Watch, job growth among U.S. businesses with fewer than 50 employees remained flat and consistent with trends observed for the year.

National hourly earnings growth for workers reached its lowest level since December of 2020 at 2.58% and continued to trend below 3% for the 10th consecutive month.

Now, I'm concerned about that because we know that inflation is trending at around 3%. If hourly workers are trending below that in their wage increases, that is potential concern for consumer spending. However, it is good news from the standpoint of small businesses as job growth, even though it's flat, it still continues.

So John Gibson, Paychex president and CEO said, “Our latest employment data once again underscores the stability and resilience of the small business labor market.”

Now, obviously, other parts of the labor market are not so resilient. The U.S. economy added only 22,000 jobs last month, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and the unemployment rate in this country is now at 4.3%, which is a four-year high. Also, the number of job openings that are there, that are available, have hit a 10-month low. That's the JOLTS survey. It fell to about 7.181 million vacancies. It marks the second consecutive monthly decline and was lower than the 7.38 million openings, as well.

So, it is really a very mixed situation going on in the labor market, but there is no question that the trend has been over the past couple of months of a slowdown in jobs and a slowdown in the labor market. And people are pointing to a lot of different reasons. It could be a slowing economy. It could be businesses shedding workers to cut costs and keep their overhead low. It could be the impact in some industries of technology like AI. And it also could be the impact of immigration reform, as well, so, jobs themselves slow.

My take, and I'll try to take a positive spin on this is that there are now opportunities for small businesses like yours and mine to find good talent. And I do have many, many clients that are actually doing pretty good this year and always looking for talent as we always have been. And with the unemployment rate ticking up with job vacancies going up, as well, with even more talent and workers available in the workforce could be an opportunity for us as business owners to find good people. So, job market but could have some opportunities.

Okay, let's stay in the workforce here. An interesting new study came out that I thought would be of interest. I found it of interest to myself. This is a study that came from the Bank of America's 2025 Workplace Benefits Report. And you ready? They find that more workers are looking to their employers for financial advice.

Now, remember with any survey, you want to take it at its source. Obviously, this Bank America, which does provide financial services and financial advice, but the survey results were interesting. They conducted the survey in May. A thousand full-time employees they surveyed and 26% said they are actively seeking support with emergency savings, debt reduction, and general financial wellness. That's doubled since the last time they did this two years ago. So, you've got almost a quarter of employees that are out there looking for help from their employers.

Now, the head of workforce benefits at Bank of America said the modern employee wants help with their broader financial goals. There she is urging employers to offer resources that support both immediate and long-term goals. Employees are asking for help in areas of guidance in retirement planning, generating income during retirement, and cultivating sound financial habits.

Guys, I could not agree more. I'm seeing a growing number of really smart business owners providing financial wellness and financial counseling to their employees. Some of them provide platforms and apps. Other people are making available financial services experts, CPAs or wealth advisors on the employer's dime, but to help the employees consult with them, counsel with them so that they can put money away for retirement, save for college, buy that next house, whatever the case may be.

Listen, the better that our employees are financially, the more comfortable they are, the less stressed that they are, the better employees that they will be, as well. And I'm seeing that as not only a growing employer benefit, but certainly addressing a need, according to this Bank of America survey.

Finally, there's been new research out that is trying to address the question about entrepreneurism and whether entrepreneurism can be taught. Now, this comes from a report in Technically, it's T-E-C-H-N-I-C-A-L dot L-Y. It is a technical site, but here's what the report says.

In 1997, Nobel laureate Kenneth Arrow suggested entrepreneurship might be shaped by so many random factors that public policy and education could never meaningfully influence it. But researchers, according to the report, have been testing that claim ever since, and just this summer, a paper offered a clear rebuttal. It's called Education Entrepreneurship Does Work, Done Well, It Leads to More Company Formation and More Successful Firms.

We need more entrepreneurs said the founder of the global entrepreneurship network. We have to do a better job now. The reason has got to be that entrepreneurship does a lot for the economy, right? According to the paper and other data, each new business per 100 people adds $500 to a country's average household income. Boosted, boosted entrepreneurship correlates to lower poverty declines, lower income inequality, and higher overall income. Newer businesses are also leading indicators of GDP growth.

So, all of that is very, very important. The question is, can entrepreneurship be taught? Now, according to this paper, with enough government resources, nonprofits, and other types of things available to help would be entrepreneurs, entrepreneurism could be taught.

My take on this is like everything else; This can be taught, but only to a certain level, and that might just be good enough. I mean, you can teach me physics, but I will never be a physicist. But I guess I can learn physics enough to be capable or competent at it for certain types of functions.

Based on the clients that I have seen, there are some people that are sort of born with an entrepreneurial gene and they are the ones that really grow and are super successful. And there's a lot of traits that they have that we don't even have to go into.

But entrepreneurship itself can be a teachable thing. You can teach people how to start up a business, file their tax returns, do their math, read financial statements, hire employees. These things can be taught. And I'm not saying that if you teach somebody, they're going to turn into the next Airbnb or Uber. But it could be such that those entrepreneurs can start a business and grow it to the extent where they are contributing to the GDP and employing people.

Interesting results of that paper. The results being entrepreneurship can be taught.

OK, so that has been this week's episode of the Paychex THRIVE Week in Review.

Before we go, just a reminder, you know, we all know that running a business is tough enough without having to worry about payroll and HR and compliance. So, that is where Paychex comes in. They handle the back-office stuff so that you can focus on what matters most, which is running and growing your business. So, check out all the Paychex can do for you. Go to paychex.com/meet-paychex. That's P-A-Y-C-H-E-X dot com forward slash M-E-E-T P-A-Y-C-H-E-X. You can also find the link in your show notes.

My name is Gene Marks. Thanks for watching or listening. We have been talking about the Paychex THRIVE Week in Review. Hope these stories and some of my comments help you run your business. We'll be back next week with some more information, more news that's impacting your business, and some thoughts on navigating around that news. Thanks very much. We'll see you then. Take care.

Do you have a topic or a guest that you would like to hear on THRIVE? Please let us know. Visit payx.me/thrivetopics and send us your ideas or matters of interest. Also, if your business is looking to simplify your HR payroll benefits or insurance services, see how Paychex can help. Visit the resource hub at paychex.com/worx. That's W-O-R-X. Paychex can help manage those complexities while you focus on all the ways you want your business to thrive.

I'm your host, Gene Marks, and thanks for joining us.

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