Entrepreneurship in America: The Best of Times, the Worst of Times
What’s the Latest?
The number of tech startups is up, but the number of entrepreneurs in American is down. And it’s been on the decline since the 1970s, according to new data that accounts for the rise of the franchise. Technology companies continue to bud and bloom (and die off in turn) throughout Silicon Valley, and they have attracted a steadily increasing amount of venture capital investiture over the years. But non-technology businesses–companies that make a physical good or sell a physical product–have steadily been gobbled up by larger franchises which, thanks to their aggregate size, can operate at much thinner profit margins than the proverbial corner store.
What’s the Big Idea?
This doesn’t necessarily mean that America as a bastion of entrepreneurial spirit and can-do attitude is on the inevitable decline. Our workers are still among the most productive in the world and in fact, “countries with much “bigger” governments (by tax revenue, at least) have much higher rates of self-employment and small business formation.” Startups are also good job creators because they remain local in an age (of globalization) when 75 percent of new jobs created by multinational corporations are created outside the United States.
