Atlantic tourism operators not optimistic for upcoming summer [Video]

While this week marks the first full week of summer, it seems many businesses in the region are not feeling particularly optimistic about the biggest tourism season of the year.

While many costs for businesses in the region continue to rise, Duncan Robertson, a senior policy analyst for the Canadian Federation of Independent Business says businesses generally aren’t anticipating the same for revenue.

“When we reached out to small business owners in the tourism sector to gauge their expectations for this summer tourism season, unfortunately what we see is that eight in 10 are not expecting any growth in terms of revenue compared to last year,” said Robertson in an interview with CTV’s Todd Batiis on Wednesday.

“Why that’s concerning is because we see costs go up across the board, we see payroll taxes go up, payroll costs go up, the carbon tax, as well as the capital gains changes coming into affect which we expect will impact around half of small businesses across …