Business Births Data: Slight Dip in Robust Growth

By SBE Council at 28 February, 2026, 9:38 am

by Raymond J. Keating -

The latest "Business Employment Dynamics" report shows that while births of new business establishments slowed to their lowest level since the first quarter 2021, the 309,000 registered in the second quarter 2025 remained well above the levels registered prior to 2021.

As for exactly what these numbers are measuring, business births and deaths cover business "establishments," which include both firms, and establishments, or locations, for existing businesses. So, while this isn't a straightforward measure of firms, it does include business firm births and deaths.

Again, while the second quarter 2025 level of 309,000 business births marked a slowdown from 328,000 in the first quarter and was the lowest level since the first quarter 2021 (308,000), it also marked four-and-a-half years of quarterly births coming in above 300,000.

That never occurred before in this dataset, with the previous range being between 233,000 and 286,000 from the first quarter 2015 though 2020, for example.

At the same time, it also must be noted that the latest data on business deaths show that they have moved above 300,000 in three of last four quarters:

● 322,000 in the fourth quarter 2023

● 281,000 in the first quarter 2024

● 333,000 in second quarter 2024

● 306,000 in the third quarter 2024

By the way, the 333,000 in the second quarter 2024 was an all-time high (beating out the 325,000 in the pandemic second quarter 2020).

Business deaths are a fact of life in a dynamic economy, but they become more of a broader economic concern when deaths run ahead of births. That was the case in the second quarter 2024, but has not otherwise occurred since the second quarter 2020.

Business births and deaths data continue to point to a "good news" story in terms of entrepreneurship in the U.S.

Raymond J. Keating is chief economist for the Small Business & Entrepreneurship Council. He is the author of " The Weekly Economist " book series, and 10 Points from Walt Disney on Entrepreneurship .