Pandemic shutters 1 of 5 US small businesses, imperiling economic recovery; cases still spiking

The pandemic has hammered small businesses across the United States — an alarming trend for an economy that’s trying to rebound from the deepest, fastest recession in U.S. history.

Normally, small employers are a vital source of hiring after a recession. They account for nearly half the economy’s output and an outsize portion of new jobs

“Small businesses are the engine of the economy,’’ said Ahu Yildirmaz, co-head of the ADP Research Institute, a think tank affiliated with the payroll processor ADP. “In past recessions, they were the ones really fueling the economy.’’

Roughly one in five small businesses have closed, according to the data firm Womply. Restaurants, bars, beauty shops and other retailers that involve face-to-face contact have been hardest hit at a time when Americans are trying to keep distance from one another.

Read the full report, and scroll below for a photo gallery from one hard-hit community:

Coronavirus cases around the world have climbed to all-time highs of more than 330,000 per day as the scourge comes storming back across Europe and spreads with renewed speed in the U.S., forcing many places to reimpose tough restrictions eased just months ago.

Well after Europe seemed to have largely tamed the virus that proved so lethal last spring, newly confirmed infections are reaching unprecedented levels in Germany, the Czech Republic, Italy and Poland. Most of the rest of the continent is seeing similar danger signs.

In the United States, new cases per day are on the rise in 44 states, with many of the biggest surges in the Midwest and Great Plains, where resistance to masks and other precautions has been running high and the virus has often been seen as just a big-city problem. Deaths per day are climbing in 30 states.

Latest updates from around the world

• Documents obtained by The Associated Press show U.S. diplomats and security officials privately warned the state of Nevada not to use Chinese-made coronavirus test kits donated by the United Arab Emirates.
• The number of Americans seeking unemployment benefits rose last week to 898,000, a historically high number that is evidence that layoffs remain a hindrance to the economy’s recovery from the pandemic recession that erupted seven months ago.
• A hospital president and the director of the health commission in the northern Chinese city of Qingdao have been fired after China’s latest coronavirus outbreak.
• The head of the World Health Organization’s Europe office says the exponential surge of coronavirus cases across the continent has warranted the restrictive measures being taken across the continent, calling them “absolutely necessary” and warning that even more drastic steps could be taken.
• Human rights activists and experts say local officials in several European countries with significant Roma populations have used the pandemic to unlawfully target the minority group.
• Seven months after screens went dark, cinemas are reopening in much of India with older titles on the marquee.

Photos: Pandemic hammers Main Street USA