DePhillips’ business survey shows state not doing enough to save economy, small-business owners

MIDLAND PARK, N.J. – The state economy will be facing a deluge of business closings if it doesn’t do more to help employers, according to a COVID-19 Business Impact Survey by Assemblyman Christopher DePhillips.

Of the 121 survey responses, nearly half (45%) will not survive the next three weeks, and one-hundred (83.3%) businesses will be closed by the end of June.

“We can’t keep waiting for the federal government to bail out state businesses,” said DePhillips (R-Bergen). “It is our responsibility as New Jersey’s elected officials to do everything we can to help New Jerseyans. Current relief efforts are far too little to really help, and if we don’t act now then significant relief efforts will be too late.”

About three in five businesses have had to let workers go, and over 85 percent of responses were businesses with fewer than 20 employees.

Over three quarters of respondents said that they might need up to $100,000 to survive the next three months.

“There are plenty of options to help businesses. We just need to put constituents first instead of worrying about government,” said DePhillips. “The little bit of action that has been taken to help business isn’t nearly enough, and the vast majority will suffer as a result.”

The EDA has announced more than $75 million, over $100 million with federal resources, in assistance for small businesses. The programs will assist between 3,000 and 5,000 small and midsized businesses, only 0.56 percent of the just under 885,000 small businesses in New Jersey.
DePhillips sent the survey by email to over 300 businesses in his district on Wednesday, March 25, and posted on Facebook.