Confidence among small business, in the upswing since the election, in January reached its highest point in more than a decade, according to the National Federal of Independent Business (NFIB), the Wall Street Journal reported today. The NFIB’s small-business optimism index edged up to 105.9 in January, the highest point since December 2004 and follows December’s largest month-over-month increase in the survey’s history. The NFIB — a conservative-leaning small-business lobby based in Washington, D.C. — said that while recent trends look much like the surge in 1983, which was followed by 7 years of gross domestic product expansion averaging 4.5 percent, such expansion is unlikely this time due to differences in excess capacity available to absorb higher demand.
