More than 18 million new business applications have been filed since President Joe Biden took office in 2021, his administration announced on Wednesday.
The new figure, the administration said, puts it “on track” for a fourth consecutive year of record applications after the metric reached new highs in each of the president’s first three years in the White House.
“We’ve had the three strongest years for new businesses on record and the small business boom that has powered our economic comeback continues,” Biden said in a statement Wednesday.
On a call with reporters to tout the development, Biden’s Small Business Administration Administrator Isabel Casillas Guzman noted the annual growth in new small business applications since 2021 is 90% faster than the rate before the pandemic.
“This isn’t just a COVID rebound or a blip,” Guzman argued.
The administration also stressed the impact it has had on minority communities, with Black business ownership more than doubling since 2019 while increasing about 40% among Latinos, White House National Economic Advisor Lael Brainard said on the call. Women, Guzman said, are creating businesses at nearly doubling the rate of men.
“At the [Small Business Administration] we're really building on these gains by ensuring that these small businesses, including startups, and the smallest of the small businesses, have the capital and the resources they need to be effective to start and build and grow resilient businesses,” Guzman said.
She noted that the SBA has distributed $52 billion in capital, disaster relief and bonds to small businesses and disaster-impacted communities in 2023. In total, the administration has spent $108 billion on supporting small businesses since Biden took office, 32% more than any previous president at the same point in their administration, Guzman added.
Biden often bills small businesses as acts of “hope,” including in his most recent State of the Union address in March when he touted, at that point, 16 million new applications under his watch.
“A record 16 million Americans are starting small businesses, and each one is a literal act of hope, with historic job growth and small-business growth for Black and Hispanics and Asian Americans,” Biden said during his address in front of Congress.
Brainard told reporters that the president makes a “special point” of meeting with entrepreneurs when he travels the country, citing two specific instances: when he visited Hero Plumbing in Milwaukee and dropped by a bike gear store, athletic shoe store and coffee shop in Allentown, Pennsylvania.
As polls show Biden struggling to convince the American public his economic agenda is working, the president has often touted job creation under his watch. More than 15 million jobs have been added since Biden took over, with Brainard saying small businesses have accounted for 650,000 of those new additions each quarter.
“This didn't happen by accident. My Administration is supporting this unprecedented wave of entrepreneurship with historic investments in small businesses and communities across the country,” Biden said in his statement.
“I’m fighting for Scranton and main street—not Park Avenue and Wall Street,” Biden added, reviving the comparison between his hometown in Pennsylvania and his 2024 competition, former President Donald Trump’s roots in New York.