The National Federation of Independent Business has released its July survey for small business confidence and it's, er, not good. Recession-level, actually.

Some specific findings:
-Investments Barely one-fifth of those surveyed said they planned to make capital expenditures over the next few months. The last time that figure in this index was that low was three decades ago. And in fact, only 6% said now was a time amenable to expansion.
-Employment Prospective small business employees might be in worse shape than small business owners, with only 17% of those surveyed announcing job openings. The recently raised federal minimum wage probably didn't help here. However, a net-percentage--that's positive minus negative--of five did intend to increase their numbe of employees.
-Financing A net-percentage of negative 12 expected improved credit conditions.
General optimism Net-percentages of negative 9 and negative 17 expected, respectively, improved real sales and an improving economy. Uh-oh.
Actual earnings The survey's most dismaying statistic? Probably the negative 37 net-percentage of those surveyed who said that their earnings had improved in July.

While businesses don't get to sit entire economic cycles out, many are attempting to do the closest thing, and just try to stay afloat until the situation improves. We can't say we blame them.