Small is Beautiful ... and Plentiful

"In the real world, the smallest atom is the helium atom. It is also the fuel that powers suns." -- Dawn Rivers Baker

The U.S. Small Business Administration notes that between 1982 and 1997, the number of small businesses in the country grew an astounding 73%. Not only do business startups increase when the economy wobbles, but technology has helped to put business ownership within reach of almost everybody. According to the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor, at any given point in time approximately one in eight adult Americans is trying to get a small business up and running and the Wall Street Journal reports that another 40% of American adults would like to start their own small business.

Almost no one disputes the crucial role that small businesses play in the U.S. economy. Overall, small businesses generate 42% of the Treasury Department's revenues. They employ 49% of the nation's non-agricultural workforce. They create almost all net new jobs; in fact, according to small business expert David Birch, large firms lost two million jobs while small businesses created ten million jobs during the high-growth period between 1994 and 1998.

These are exciting times in the microbusiness community, times when more and more people are able to truly participate in the U.S. economy. Historically disadvantaged groups are starting businesses in record numbers: the SBA Office of Advocacy reports that self-employment grew among women, blacks and Latinos by 33%, 37% and 15%, respectively, between 1979 and 2003. These are people who are seeking and finding self-sufficiency to replace entitlement, and self-respect to replace the bitterness of exclusion.

Most of these businesses not only start small, they stay small. According to the most recent statistics available from the Census Bureau, 75% of the small businesses in the country are non-employer businesses — economic entities that consist of a sole owner/worker with a product or a service and little else. Further data available from the Office of Advocacy shows that 90% of all U.S. businesses (including publicly traded firms) employ between zero and four workers, making them microbusinesses.

These very small businesses also don't make very much money when measured against the standards of most publicly traded companies. On average, non-employer businesses earn only about $43,000 in annual revenues — a decent living and, for some microenterprise owners, a vast improvement in their standard of living. In fact, 63% of all the businesses in the country earn less than $50,000 in annual revenues, while only 5% of them make more than $1 million per year.

While almost all businesses start as microbusinesses, the National Commission on Entrepreneurship found that only about 4% will go on to become the fast-growth gazelles that you read about in the pages of Inc. A few will grow to more than 20 employees, but the vast majority of America's businesses are very, very small.

And yet, for all that they may seem insignificant little specs in the gigantic sea of the U.S. economy, the democratization of business ownership that occurred at the end of the 20th century is changing the dynamic of that economy.

The MicroEnterprise Journal is devoted to reporting and analyzing business news that effects microbusinesses nationwide, news that often flies under the radar of major business news publications. Readers learn about legislative initiatives, federal regulations and policy trends in terms of how their microbusiness will be effected, and whether proposed small business assistance programs will be of any use to the smallest of the small.

The MicroEnterprise Journal also covers market analysis and applied economics, again, as they effect microbusinesses in various industry segments. No matter how small their firm, the smart business owner must look at his or her enterprise in terms of the big picture. We show them that big piture, from their own perspective.

In doing all that, The MicroEnterprise Journal also offers those very small businesses something even more important than information: respect.