By Monica Braun, former staff member
Women-owned businesses are gaining economic impact and clout.
A National Women’s Business Council analysis of U.S. Census data from the 2012 Survey of Business Owners shows significant growth since 2007. As of 2012, there are 9.9 million women-owned businesses – a 27.5% rise. The analysis also showed that Women-owned businesses generated 1.6 trillion in total receipts, which is up from 1.2 trillion in 2007. An increase of 35%! For comparison, male-owned businesses saw an increase of 33%. While sole proprietorships account for 89.4% of businesses owned by women, employee hiring has also increased by 19.5%.
African-American women own more than 1.5 million businesses across the U.S., a 67.5% jump from 2007. There are 1.48 million Hispanic women-owned businesses in the U.S, an increase of 87.31% since 2007. And 754,874 Asian American women own businesses, up 44.3% from 2007. Another area of tremendous growth was in veteran women-owned businesses, which increased by 206% from 2007 to a total of 384,548 businesses nationwide.
Over 100 Women’s Business Centers across the country offer counseling, business training and other services to women in business in all 50 states. The Center for Rural Affairs’ REAP Women’s Business Center has been proudly serving the women of Nebraska as part of the association since 2001.
