Small businesses are in deep hole due to the coronavirus pandemic and many, according to a Census Bureau survey, are on the brink of extinction. 

The survey, highlighted this week in a newsletter from Comptroller Tom DiNapoli's office on economic trends in New York, found 18% of responding businesses have either no cash on hand for operations or enough for only two weeks or less. 

A similar number, 17%, have eough for three weeks to a month, while 24% can get by for one month to two months. And one-quarter of small businesses have seen operating capacity decline by half or more from a year ago. 

New York's unemployment rate in July stood at 15.9% though the economy added private-sector jobs. At the same time, the national economy has started to add jobs as well, and the unemployment rate in August fell to 8.4%, the federal government announced earlier on Friday. 

Still, small businesses in New York have taken the crisis especially hard: 45% of small businesses have had a negative effective from the pandemic, the second-highest among the states and 12% above the naitonal average. Only 10% said the pandemic had little to no effect on their business. 

And the hole may be a deep one: More than half of small businesses in New York believe that it will take more than six months for business operations to return to a normal level from a year ago. One in 10 businesses survey say their companies will never return to normal.