Despite last week’s headlines about alarmingly soft job growth, millions of Americans have been starting businesses at unprecedented rates. This trend started in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic and is still holding strong. However the shift is not accounted for in traditional labor statistics, which focus exclusively on W-2 payroll jobs. New business formation is a vital piece of the business landscape of the United States and can counteract the economic impact of a slowdown of traditional job creation.
Job growth numbers from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) miss this point, highlighted by the most recent data: The economy appears to have added only 73,000 jobs in July 2025, significantly less than expected and not enough to keep up with population growth. Adding to the concern, th