New U.S. Business Establishments: Surging or Stalling?

Figure 1: Total U.S. establishments, March, 1994-2025
Notes: The Business Employment Dynamics (BDM) is derived from the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages (QCEW) and published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The Business Dynamics Statistics (BDS) is derived from the Longitudinal Business Database (LBD) and published by the Census Bureau. Shaded regions indicate recessions.

x-axis: Years from 1994 to 2025 y-axis: The number of establishments, in millions Line 1: The number of establishments in the Business Employment Dynamics (BED) data Line 2: The number of establishments in the Business Dynamics Statistics (BDS) data We see that the number of establishments in the BED and BDS are about the same until around 2007, after which the BED's count grows faster than the BDS' count.

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Figure 2: U.S. private sector establishments, by industry, March 2023.
Notes: The Business Employment Dynamics (BDM) is derived from the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages (QCEW) and published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The Business Dynamics Statistics (BDS) is derived from the Longitudinal Business Database (LBD) and published by the Census Bureau.

x-axis: Number of establishments in millions, from 0 to 2(million). y-axis: The name of each supersector defined as a 1-digit NAICS industry For each supersector there are two bars showing the count of establishments in the BED versus the BDS. Most supersectors have a similar counts for each dataset, except for "Professional and Business Services" and "Education and Health Services" for which the BED is notably larger.

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Figure B1: Total U.S. employment, March, 1994-2024
Notes: The Business Employment Dynamics (BDM, solid) is derived from the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages (QCEW) and published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The Business Dynamics Statistics (BDS) is derived from the Longitudinal Business Database (LBD, dashed) and published by the Census Bureau. Shaded regions indicate recessions.

x-axis: Years from 1994 to 2024 y-axis: The number of workers, in millions Line 1: The number of workers in the Business Employment Dynamics (BED) data Line 2: The number of workers in the Business Dynamics Statistics (BDS) data We see that the number of workers in the BDS and BED are both growing over the sample period, but the BDS has a larger employment count at all point, by about 5-7 million.

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Figure B2: U.S. employment, by industry, March 2023.
Notes: The Business Employment Dynamics (BDM) is derived from the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages (QCEW) and published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The Business Dynamics Statistics (BDS) is derived from the Longitudinal Business Database (LBD) and published by the Census Bureau.

x-axis: Number of workers in millions, from 0 to 30(million). y-axis: The name of each supersector defined as a 1-digit NAICS industry For each supersector there are two bars showing the count of workers in the BED versus the BDS. Most supersectors have a similar counts for each dataset, except for "Professional and Business Services" and "Education and Health Services" for which the BDS is notably larger.

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