Business Births & Dissolutions - Statistics
Here's a handy site should you be approached by local media asking "How many small businesses were started or disappeared around here in the last few years?" The Census Bureau has a section on their site which they call their Business Information Tracking Series . The page presents a series of links to spreadsheet files, providing data showing growth/decline of businesses (small or otherwise) over specific two-year periods (2002-2003, 2001-2002, etc.). Each shows data by the U.S. in general, as well as by state & specific industry sector. Lately, they've also been providing data on metropolitan areas, too. If you click on "Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSAs), totals" under the 2002-2003 banner, you'll be presented with a fairly substantial spreadsheet. Each MSA takes up three lines: "Initial year establishments," "Establishment births," and "Establishment deaths". In column D, for example, you'll notice that