Kim Kardashian came under fire for her comments about how 'it seems like nobody wants to work these days” – but some small to medium business owners agree.

The latest MYOB small to medium enterprise (SME) Snapshot – a survey of more than 500 local SMEs – revealed 59 per cent of SMEs had increased wages, but about a third were still struggling to fill job vacancies.

Doug Jarvis, owner of two speciality Doug Jarvis Butchers stores in Mt Manganui and Pāpāmoa, is working seven days a week because he is eight staff members down.

This is despite the official unemployment rate being just 3.3 per cent in the three months to the end of June, according to Stats NZ.

Jarvis relies heavily on overseas workers and says it isn't worth advertising the jobs, when an ad on Trade Me cost more than $100, and he only had one applicant in six weeks.

'It's just a s... show to be honest, there's just nobody I can get from anywhere.

'I'm working seven days a week, and it's a killer. To the point where I'm like ‘I don't want to go in today', but I know I have to because I'm the owner.”

In May Jarvis, who has been a butcher for 38 years, was tipped to breaking point following break-ins and thefts from his stores in Mt Maunganui and Pāpāmoa.

The MYOB snapshot found a quarter of businesses had roles vacant at the moment. But the majority of businesses described their current staffing levels as satisfactory (51 per cent) or good (39 per cent) based on what they needed to operate.

Jarvis is also struggling to get any teenagers to do part-time weekend work, and he's noticed a change in behaviour in the last five years.

'They're just not interested in working whatsoever.”

‘They're just not interested in working whatsoever,' Jarvis says about the younger generation. Photo: John Borren/SunLive.

Jarvis has raised all of his employees' wages to keep up with the cost of living.

”I just can't see anything changing,” Jarvis says.

Other sectors struggling to employ staff included SMEs operating in the manufacturing sector (57 per cent) and construction and trades (37 per cent).

Almost half of the manufacturing sector businesses surveyed has roles vacant, pointing to a real strain on the industry.

Insights from the survey also showed that SME confidence in the economy had fallen to a level close to that recorded at the beginning of the first national lockdown in March 2022 (79 per cent).

More than 70 per cent of SME owners and operators expected the economy to decline over the next 12 months, while just 17 per cent believed an improvement was likely.

MYOB spokesperson Jo Tozer says the data paints a troubling picture for local SMEs who are facing a perfect storm of pressures.

'Between the impacts of inflation, ongoing supply disruptions, employee sickness and the very real challenge of finding staff, it's little wonder that SME confidence has now dipped close to what we saw as New Zealand entered its first lockdown,” Tozer says.

-Stuff/Brianna Mcilraith.