The short version

Almost every business in the US is a small one: 99.9% of them.
Small businesses employ 62.3 million people, close to half of everyone in private jobs.
About 8 in 10 new business locations make it past year one. About half make it to year five.

You are the economy

When people talk about business, they picture big companies. The numbers say otherwise. Small businesses are nearly all of them, and they pay close to half of the private sector's workers.

US small businessesSBA, 2026

Small businessesIn the United States36,207,130

Share of all businesses99.9%

People employedBy small businesses62.3 million

Share of private sector workers45.9%

How long new ones last

The government follows every new business location and checks each March whether it is still open. Think of 10 new shops opening on one street.

Still openBLS, March 2026

After 1 yearAbout 8 of the 1078.9%

After 5 yearsAbout 5 of the 1047.2%

The one person business

Sole proprietors report business profit on their own tax return. Here is what the IRS counted across all of them.

Sole proprietorsIRS, tax year 2022

Returns with a sole proprietor businessNot counting farmsAbout 31.0 million

Total profit, after lossesAll of them together$410.7 billion

Profit per returnOur math from the two lines aboveAbout $13,260

What it means for you

These numbers do not say why some businesses close. They do say that the first five years are hard.

You cannot fix what you cannot see. Knowing your profit, your cash and what you owe every month gives you time to change course while a problem is still small.

Three numbers to check every month

1Profit: did you make more than you spent?
2Cash: how many months could you run on what is in the bank?
3Tax: how much of this should you set aside?

How Kept helps

Kept connects to your bank and keeps all three numbers current for you. Open the app any day and see your profit, your cash and your tax estimate, without doing the books yourself.

See Kept reports