Friday’s upon us again, so we’ve wrapped up the week’s most important small business headlines for you to catch up on. This week, the Government unveiled the 2012/13 budget, MYOB revealed a significant number of SMBs fail when it comes to their EOFY requirements and unemployment fell to its lowest rate in 12 months.
Business confidence slides, as economic uncertainty rises
Ongoing economic uncertainty caused business confidence to fall nearly ten points in February, to 108.9, after six consecutive months of rises to January 2012.
The findings from the Roy Morgan Monthly Business Confidence Survey show there has been a 57 percent decrease in businesses who consider that ‘Australia will have good economic conditions in the next 12 months’.
According to Roy Morgan industry communications director Norman Morris, although business confidence for all states and industries remains positive overall, major differences exist between them.
EOFY black spots found in SMBs tax knowledge
Last financial year, the ATO evaluated 1.4 million SMBs against its risk detection systems, which led to 16,000 being investigated.
According to MYOB’s Kristy Sheppard, small business owners need to plug their EOFY knowledge black spots in order to escape the attention of the tax office.
Learn how to make social media work, with editor Jen Bishop
Join Dynamic Business editor Jen Bishop at a seminar hosted by She Inspires, to learn about the social media tools that will take your business to the next level.
Held in Sydney at 5.30pm on 24 May 2012, the event will see Bishop, as well as She Business’s Suzy Jacobs and Centric Social Media’s Brendon Walker talk about how they’re using social media to grow their business.
The panel will be moderated by Powerhouse Presentation founder Mariette Rups-Donnelly, who will also facilitate a Q&A with the audience.
The Budget: What’s in it for small business
Treasurer Wayne Swan unveiled the 2012/13 budget in Canberra on Tuesday, returning it to surplus and detailing a number of measures he said would benefit small business. But many SMB’s have been left wanting by the budget, saying it doesn’t deliver enough support to the sector.
Swan said the Labor Government was delivering a surplus on time as promised, which would fund new cost of living relief for Australian families and “help businesses invest, compete and adapt to an economy in transition.”
Swan revealed the Government’s loss carry-back tax scheme, which will allow businesses to claim losses of up to $1 million against tax they’ve paid in the two years prior. Swan said the measure will cost the Government close to $714 million and benefit businesses “that aren’t in the fast lanes” as a result of the multi-speed economy.
How to put an end to employee boredom in the workplace
Many businesses are seeing a decline in productivity, as boredom causes more and more employees to turn to non-work related activities to keep themselves entertained during work hours.
New research by Robert Walters has found employees suffer from a mid afternoon slump in productivity as their energy levels dwindle and they get bored. Boredom seems to hit hardest around mid afternoon, with 50 percent of employees admitting they feel bored between 1.30pm -3.30pm.
The survey, which asked 1900 Australian employees how they deal with workplace boredom and lulls, found 85 percent of people do things throughout the workday that were not directly related to their job.
Unemployment rate drops to 4.9 percent
Unemployment has fallen to its lowest level in 12 months, dipping below 5 percent as a result of 15,500 additional jobs being added to the local economy.
The seasonally adjusted rate fell by 0.2 percent, with unemployment sitting well below the 5.5 percent forecasted by the Federal Government for 2012/13 in the budget this week. Dow Jones economists were expecting unemployment to sit around 5.3 percent for April, according to MarketWatch.
According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, the fall in the number of people in full-time employment was offset by a sharp rise in the number of people part-time employed – up 26,000.
