Small enterprises account for over 50% of jobs

SLIGHTLY MORE than half of all people in employment in the second quarter of 2007 worked for small enterprises, according to a report by the Central Statistics Office (CSO) published yesterday.

The annual CSO report on Small Business in Ireland showed that 56 per cent of employment in the second quarter of 2007 was in workplaces where fewer than 50 people were employed.

In total, 1,175,800 people worked at small workplaces. Of these, 839,300 were employees, 216,600 were self-employed and 107,900 were self-employed with employees.

These figures include farming and the public sector, as well as business sectors.

The average annual wage or salary for employees in a small business was €32,453 in 2006. The average salary in larger enterprises was €44,794 a year, according to the report.

In 2005, four out of five industrial enterprises (81 per cent) were small firms employing fewer than 50 people.

These firms employed 50,000 people, just more than a fifth of total industrial employment.

Larger enterprises (50 or more people) employed 181,100 people in 2005 and generated 93 per cent of the total turnover in industry, according to the report. The vast majority of small industrial firms were Irish-owned (95 per cent). Almost 42 per cent of larger firms were foreign-owned.

In the services sector, almost all enterprises (98 per cent) were small. There were 82,100 small businesses that employed more than 380,000 people in services in 2005. This was more than half of total employment in the sector, according to the report.

Small firms accounted for almost half (49 per cent) of the total turnover in the services sector, generating a total turnover of just under €81.6 billion in 2005.

The report found that of the 316,300 non-Irish nationals in employment in the second quarter of 2007, fewer than half (47 per cent) worked in small workplaces.

The report included comparisons with European averages. It found that almost three-quarters of manufacturing turnover in Ireland was generated by large enterprises while the EU average was 60 per cent.

In 2005, Ireland recorded gross value added per person employed of €51,600 in distributive services. The EU average was € 33,000 per person employed.

Gross value added per person employed in the construction sector in Ireland was significantly higher than the EU average for all employment size classes.