It's a fairly permanent situation. You can always tough something out for a little while, but it's getting to the point that it's really factoring into people's medium to longer-term plans.

There's no simple answer. We're certainly not going to be able to attract enough immigrants who can move in, buy a business and make a go of it, even though that's undoubtedly a partial solution.

And the number one reason is fuel prices,

If you have fewer jobs created and less of a boost to the economy overall, then that effect naturally filters out,

It's just not practical. Seventy-five per cent of businesses in this country have fewer than five employees.

The vacancy rate for the smallest companies---those with fewer than five employees---is four times that of the largest firms in the study.