Small Business Facts

The Office of Advocacy’s winter economic bulletin examines the continued recovery from the COVID-19 recession. Small business variables like self-employment, income, loan delinquencies, and loan balances have trends that represent…

Advocacy has released its newest infographic spotlighting veteran-owned businesses. Veterans own almost two million businesses and employ over five million Americans. The infographic uses the most recent Census Bureau data to show the…

While there are multiple reasons to own a small business, most firm owners cite wanting to be their own boss and making more money as important reasons for owning their own business. Self-employment is mostly driven by opportunity, with…

Immigrant owners consist of roughly 18 percent of business owners with employees and almost 23 percent of business owners without employees. Immigrant-owned businesses are found in every sector of the U.S. economy. Immigrants made up 36.8%…

In 2019, small businesses with 10–499 employees performed $70.6 billion worth of R&D work and employed over 500,000 R&D workers. Among businesses engaged in R&D, small businesses spend a much higher percentage of their sales on…

Experts often use patenting activity as a proxy for innovation. Data from the National Science Foundation show that small businesses that engage in R&D generate more patents per employee than larger businesses that engage in R&D.…

The Office of Advocacy’s Spring Economic Bulletin examines how small businesses continue to recover from the COVID-19 recession. Recent trends show small businesses have weathered the pandemic, but new challenges have arisen. Currently,…

New data from the U.S. Census Bureau indicates that the tightening labor market is disproportionately impacting smaller businesses. 23.4 percent of small businesses cited labor needs in August 2020, which increased to over 40 percent at…

Despite losing 9.1 million jobs in the first two quarters of 2020, small businesses job growth rebounded swiftly following the COVID-19 recession. In the four quarters following, small businesses have gained 5.5 million jobs, making up for…

The Office of Advocacy’s bi-annual Economic Bulletin examines new data on how small businesses have recovered since the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic. Both self-employment and proprietor income have recovered…