Nearly half of California’s private workforce is employed by small businesses

By Brittney Sherman

Brittney Sherman

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused the San Jose metropolitan area, which includes the South Valley, to have the fifth highest business closure rate in the United States.

The framework of shopping habits has drastically shifted since March, causing residents to focus on convenience, bulk-ordering, and online shopping instead of local patronage. This change in consumer behavior is exacerbating the financial hardships of our local businesses already struggling to survive the shelter-in-place restrictions by the COVID19 pandemic. Buying local matters.

Nearly half of the state of California’s private workforce is employed by small businesses who represent the spine of our economy and identity of our communities. Why is it vital to keep local small businesses in operation?

For every purchase you make at a Morgan Hill store, our city receives 1 percent of the sales tax revenue. You might think that that is not a lot of money. But every dollar counts. Every time you gas up at a local gas station, buy retail goods or food in our community, the city gets 1 percent of your purchase, which in turn supports local services like police, fire, and road repair. In contrast, for every online purchase, the city receives only 2 percent of the 1 percent because sales tax revenue from online purchases are shared countywide.

Here are five clear benefits of the power of buying local:

  • You help a small business stay afloat.
  • You support local jobs.
  • More money comes back to the city to help pay for residential services.
  • Community initiatives/events benefit as small businesses donate two times more often.
  • You help the environment by reducing the carbon footprint

We know that it is nearly impossible to stop online shopping completely. But if we just curbed our online shopping behavior by 1 percent or 5 percent, this would be the result:

If every Morgan Hill resident increased their spending at a Morgan Hill business by 1 percent, it would result in nearly $48,000 in local tax revenue and support about 60 jobs.

If every Morgan Hill resident increased their spending at a Morgan Hill business by 5 percent, it would result in nearly $240,000 in local tax revenue and support 304 jobs.

The Morgan Hill Chamber of Commerce is proud to partner with the city of Morgan Hill to launch a “Buy Local Campaign” in support of local businesses. This will be especially helpful to increase the quality of life of our community during the holiday season when people will spend more on gift purchases. To learn more, please visit our website at www.buylocalmorganhill.com Together we can successfully “preserve our town one purchase at a time.”