Small businesses that adopt AI are more optimistic about growth, revenue, and employment

SMBs using AI are more likely to expect a positive impact on employment AI could be helping them to overcome constraints and unlock more revenue Expectations vs.

<![CDATA[ <article> <ul><li><strong>SMBs using AI are more likely to expect a positive impact on employment</strong></li><li><strong>AI could be helping them to overcome constraints and unlock more revenue</strong></li><li><strong>Expectations vs. reality gap shows only 31% have increased sales so far</strong></li></ul><p>A new <a href="https://libertystreeteconomics.newyorkfed.org/2026/10/ai-adoption-and-employment-expectations-evidence-from-a-survey-of-small-business-owners/" target="_blank">study</a> by the NY Federal Reserve Bank has revealed SMBs who actually adopt AI feel far more optimistic about hiring and revenue growth than non-adopters, and the data comes from a near 50:50 split, because nearly half (46%) of US SMBs already use AI, it found.</p><p>AI adopters reportedly recorded a 33 percentage point net expectation of higher employment in the next year compared with 15 percentage points for non-adopters, which is more than double.</p><p>But with only one in two (51%) adopters having actually integrated AI into their business processes either partially or fully, many are likely still just experimenting with the tech and not embedded it into actual use cases.</p><h2 id="positivity-about-ai-is-actually-strongest-among-ai-adopters">Positivity about AI is actually strongest among AI adopters</h2><p>On the jobs front, while initial concerns largely centered around AI replacing human workers, three in four (77%) of the surveyed businesses actually reported no change in their current labor costs due to AI, indicating that AI is largely assisting existing workers rather than outright replacing them.</p><p>But that's not to say that finances are set to stay flat – it's actually a much more positive story. Adopters are the most likely to expect healthy revenue growth, and the businesses that are struggling the most financially could be among the most optimistic.</p><p>Still, expectations and reality are totally different metrics, and fewer than one in three (31%) have actually reported increased sales due to using AI.</p><p>"In other words, it seems unlikely that the association between AI use and positive revenue expectations is spurious," the report concludes.</p><p>Still, the researchers agree that "AI may be helping some small businesses overcome specific operational or technical constraints that limit revenue generation."</p><figure class="van-image-figure pull-right inline-layout" data-bordeaux-image-check ><div class='image-full-width-wrapper'><div class='image-widthsetter' style="max-width:676px;"><p class="vanilla-image-block" style="padding-top:31.51%;"><img id="diM9tpwF2Lz85R8q85CT78" name="tr-g_news" alt="Google logo on a black background next to text reading 'Click to follow TechRadar'" src="https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/diM9tpwF2Lz85R8q85CT78-1920-80.jpg" mos="" align="right" fullscreen="" width="676" height="213" attribution="" endorsement="" class="pull-rightinline"></p></div></div></figure> </article> ]]>