The Recent Trend on Full-Time Entrepreneurship

By SBE Council at 21 November, 2024, 3:06 pm

by Raymond J. Keating -

What's the latest trend on full-time entrepreneurship?

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics provides data each month on incorporated and unincorporated self-employed, that is, individuals who identify their primary income coming from owning a business.

Combining these two datasets (since incorporated numbers are not seasonally-adjusted, we use non-seasonally adjusted data for each) provides a timely estimate of full-time entrepreneurs in the U.S.

The monthly average for the first ten months of 2024 came in at 16.757 million.

Compared to the same 10-month averages going back to 2000 (when the incorporated data began), the 2024 level was the highest. After declining in 2020, the number of self-employed has increased in each year. That's welcome news.

However, the 2007 average registered 16.214 million. Therefore, from 2007 to 2014, the number of self-employed declined, and then sluggishly and unevenly recovered.

In fact, the 2024 10-month-average high of 16.757 translates into a mere 3.3 percent increase over a 17-year span. That's troubling.

Entrepreneurship needs revitalization in the U.S., and that should be a primary objective of the next presidential administration and Congress. From a policy perspective that means we need substantive tax relief (such as simplifying the tax code, cutting individual income, capital gains and corporate income tax rates), deregulation and regulatory-system modernization, advancing free trade and opening global markets, and reining in government spending.

Raymond J. Keating is chief economist for the Small Business & Entrepreneurship Council. His latest books on the economy are The Weekly Economist: 52 Quick Reads to Help You Think Like an Economist , The Weekly Economist II: 52 More Quick Reads to Help You Think Like an Economist and The Weekly Economist III: Another 52 Quick Reads to Help You Think Like an Economist .

Public link

Please use the above public link if you want to share this noodl on another website.