US = high percent of small businesses & self-employed? No.

An important part of our national identity is built around the idea that – thanks to low taxes, limited regulation, unfettered labor markets, and a national spirit of entrepreneurship – the United States offers an environment for small business that is unmatched anywhere else in the world.

The international economic data, however, tell a different story about the state of U.S. small
business. By every measure of small-business employment, the United States has among the world’s
smallest small-business sectors (as a proportion of total national employment).

One plausible explanation for the consistently higher shares of self-employment and small-business
employment in the rest of the world’s rich economies is that all have some form of universal access
to health care. The high cost to self-employed workers and small businesses of the private,
employer-based health care system in place in the United States may act as a significant deterrent to
small start-up companies, an experience not shared by entrepreneurs in countries with universal
access to health care.

We use the most recently available, internationally comparable data from the Organization for
Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) to measure the share of employment in small
businesses in 22 rich democracies. The OECD data demonstrate that:

• The United States has the second lowest share of self-employed workers (7.2 percent) – only
Luxembourg has a lower share (6.1 percent). France (9.0 percent), Sweden (10.6 percent),
Germany (12.0 percent) the United Kingdom (13.8 percent), Italy (26.4 percent) and 14
other rich countries all have higher proportions of self-employment.

• The United States has among the lowest shares of employment in small businesses in
manufacturing. Only 11.1 percent of the U.S. manufacturing workforce is in enterprises with
fewer than 20 employees.

Eighteen other rich countries have a higher share of manufacturing employment in enterprises of this size, including Germany (13.0 percent), Sweden (14.4 percent), France (18.0 percent), the United Kingdom (18.1 percent), and Italy (30.9 percent).

Only Ireland (9.6 percent) and Luxembourg (8.5 percent) have a lower share of manufacturing employment in enterprises with fewer than 20 employees. (Raising the cutoff for a small business to fewer than 500 employees does not significantly alter the
relative position of the United States.)

• U.S. small businesses have a much lower share of employment than the comparison
economies do in the two high-tech fields for which the OECD publishes data: computer-related
services and research and development.

• The United States has the second lowest share of computer-related service employment in
firms with fewer than 100 employees (32.0 percent). Only Spain had a lower share (27.0
percent), while 13 countries with available data had a higher proportion of employment in
this sector in small businesses including France (44.7 percent), Germany (48.7 percent),
Sweden (49.4 percent), the United Kingdom (67.5 percent), and Italy (73.2 percent).

• Similarly, the United States has the third lowest share of research and development related
employment in firms with fewer than 100 employees (25.3 percent). Only the United
Kingdom (22.5 percent) and the Netherlands (20.3 percent) had a lower share, while 9
countries with available data had a higher proportion of employment in this sector in small
businesses including France (33.1 percent), Sweden (34.4 percent), Germany (35.0 percent),
and Italy (74.8 percent).

http://www.cepr.net/documents/publications/small-business-2009-08.pdf



In fact, it's entirely predictable that "the world's most advanced capitalist economy" would have low rates of small business/self-employed.

Capitalism = the concentration of productive capital, & markets, into fewer & fewer hands. This means most of the population winds up working for the owners, or unemployed.

my wife's employer(Doctor)didn't put us on their healthcare plan.
I'll take risk but only to a limit.
I often wonder how many would work for themselves if the cost of healthcare was take out of the equation.

definition of "small business." In other places, orgs. with <500 employees are considered "small." That's the definition that I think is used by those people who say that the majority of new jobs are created by small businesses. But when I think "small business", I think <20 employees. Do most other people?

More like "the world's most fucked up capitalist economy"

:thumbsup:

It enables small businesses to compete successfully against them and to retain employees.

yuppers.

You can quote me if you like.

on edit: see post #1 for anecdotal evidence.

It makes risk taking very difficult. Why open yourself up to that.

It worked for B. Richard above because he was lucky enough to have an employed spouse. Imagine a family run business where both spouses work it. What happens to them if they get pregnant, sick, etc?

vould be predictably absent in advanced capitalist society! Only in glorious Soviet paradise eez possible to make small beezness trough alliance of workers and petty bourgeoise elements!

All is predicted and determined by scientific approach to economic and social analeesees!

i have to have healthcare. period.