U.S. Small businesses created approximately 50,000 new jobs in March and almost 175,000 since mid 2009, while wages and hours worked remained flat.Small business employment increased in March over February by a seemingly paltry 0.25% according to the monthly Intuit Small Business Employment Index. Mathematical alchemy projects that quarter percent month-to-month rise to an annual growth rate of 3%, which, while not robust, is nothing to sneeze at. Put into actual jobs numbers the March increases translates to 50,000 new jobs and looking back to June 2009, the index charts that small businesses added approximately 175,000 U.S. jobs.

The monthly report from Intuit aggregates employment data from roughly 50,000 small businesses with fewer than 20 employees that use Intuit Payroll.

At least one economist sees the data as encouraging news. Susan Woodward, an economist who helped Intuit create the index, said, "All the numbers indicate a continuing recovery for small businesses that began in the summer of 2009. And while the numbers may seem small, they show clearly that small businesses are hiring, and stopped trimming their payrolls last summer."

Though the number of jobs created by small businesses may be pointing upward, wages and hours worked haven't budged. The Intuit index found that the average wage remained flat in March at $2,562 (translating to $31,000 annually).

The same trajectory held true for hours worked with March holding steady at 103.1 hours worked by hourly employees (that translates to a less than all-consuming 24-hour work week).

More findings of the Intuit Small Business Employment Index are available here.

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