The Boom of Microbusinesses in America

-

     The onset of a worldwide pandemic sparked the increase of online business and e-commerce. As we witnessed businesses be shut down when the nation was put on lockdown, a new economic opportunity arose. With this wave of online business came the new concept of microbusinesses. Online microbusinesses are defined as businesses with a discrete domain name and an active website. About 90% of these online businesses employ fewer than 10 employees. Founding a microbusiness is easy and simply takes a passion of some form. The pandemic started a new trend of these so called microbusinesses. In fact, Americans created 2.8 million more online microbusinesses in 2020 than in 2019, which was following the hit of the pandemic. This increase in online businesses aligns with the recent overall increase in entrepreneurial activity. Founders of microbusinesses generally have a separate profession, are following interests, and do not associate with a larger industry. This entails many negative downsides including a limited access to capital. Public policy is key in the aspect of small business growth because of those natural barricades. Productive public policy can be the foundation for business creation and growth, even economic success as a whole. One major concern for online microbusinesses are the policies surrounding broadband access. Americans who live in densely-populated areas have reliable access to broadband, high internet speeds and mobile data coverage. On the other hand, rural and remote regions of the country still have very limited broadband access which negatively affects how competitive online businesses, especially microbusinesses, can be in those areas. The President and CEO of the Business Council of Alabama, Katie Boyd Britt, has been working with both public and private partnerships to get Alabama equipped in all areas with high-speed broadband. Accomplishing this would allow for more online business growth as people in more rural areas would gain access to broadband. Public policy regarding business growth usually falls down to the state level which also makes it much more difficult to make progress. However, if more business people continue to take initiative in the realm of public policy, business creation and entrepreneurship would be inclined to rise. 



If you would like to read more, access these links where I got my information:

www.uschamber.com

www.brookings.edu


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Wealth Inequality in America

-
Image
      The biggest flaw in our capitalist economy is the fact that there is already a basis of inequality in our country. Theoretically, capitalism provides an equal opportunity for those who are willing to work for it. However, the playing field in American society is so far from level. The crookedness brought on by generations of systemic racism and discrimination has caused minorities to be put at a natural disadvantage. Race is not the only factor in wealth inequality, yet is the most potent, and in the most dire need of help. Ideas like affirmative action, in the sense of college admissions, have attempted to provide some equity to minorities. However, to get to the root of the problem, economic policies are the only way to diminish the economic gap.      Wealth inequality is not necessarily a racial issue. While it often targets minorities who are handed less opportunities, to fix the economic disparity, it must be looked at from a broader sc...
Read more

Pre-colonial African Economics: Examining Chinua Achebe's "Things Fall Apart"

-
Image
New parents are often told that they need to give their children the freedom to make mistakes. It is said that a young human learns best by adapting to their own mistakes and the stimuli of their environment, not by the hand of an overprotective parent. Contemporary economies very closely parallel this concept. Innovation tends to come as a result of an openly operating free market – governed by the laws of supply and demand – and not a command economy that has been strangled by authority. Throughout the novel Things Fall Apart , the author, Chinua Achebe, is trying to get the point across that pre-colonial African civilizations have been handed a Western bias that squishes an entire continent into a single story; and so, through his literary work, he develops a refurbished image that allows the complexities of African culture to shine through. In specific, he examines the culture of a cluster of villages in 19th century Nigeria. Although it may not be the main focus of his writing, th...
Read more

The Fall of FTX

-
Image
      Within the last month,  Bahamas-based cryptocurrency exchange, FTX filed for bankruptcy along with the resignation of chief executive Sam Bankman-Fried . The quick demise of the company has shocked the crypto world and left many wondering about the legitimacy of other cryptocurrency exchange platforms.      A significant cause of this quick downfall was a competitor's, Binance , withdrawal from a deal to purchase FTX.  Previously, Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao had announced that the cryptocurrency firm had reached a non-binding deal to buy FTX’s non-U.S. businesses for an undisclosed amount, allegedly rescuing the company from a liquidity crisis that Zhao foresaw. However, merely a day later Zhao pulled out from the deal and essentially announced that FTX was a lost cause. Following the suspect dismantling of this deal between FTX and Binance and the inevitable downfall of FTX, the US Department of Justice launched a full on probe against the ...
Read more