The U.S. Census Bureau has released new data detailing the demographic characteristics of business owners in the United States, including information on sex, race, ethnicity, and veteran status. For the first time, this release provides estimates of employer firms by owner characteristics across industry sectors and congressional districts.
The data are sourced from two main surveys: the Annual Business Survey (ABS), which focuses on businesses with paid employees, and the Nonemployer Statistics by Demographics (NES-D), which covers businesses without paid employees. Together, these sources offer a comprehensive overview of business ownership in the country.
According to figures for 2023, there were 36.4 million employer and nonemployer businesses nationwide, generating $50 trillion in receipts. Of these businesses, women owned 14.2 million entities with $2.8 trillion in receipts, while veterans owned 1.6 million with $1 trillion in receipts.
The ABS reported approximately 5.9 million employer firms for 2023; among them, women owned about 1.4 million (22.9%) and veterans owned around 261,000 (4.4%). The demographic breakdown showed that White-owned firms made up 80.6% (4.8 million) of employer businesses with $17 trillion in receipts; Asian-owned firms represented 11.5% (685,000) with $1.2 trillion; Hispanic-owned firms accounted for 8.4% (496,000) with $730.3 billion; Black or African American-owned firms made up 3.4% (201,000) with $249 billion; American Indian or Alaska Native-owned firms comprised 0.9% (55,000) with $70.8 billion; and Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander-owned firms accounted for 0.2% (9,000) with $13.1 billion.
“The ABS is sponsored by the National Science Foundation’s National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics (NCSES) and conducted jointly with the Census Bureau,” according to the release statement.
In addition to industry sector and congressional district data for employer businesses, this release also includes breakdowns by urban/rural classification, employment size categories, receipt size groups, and years a firm has been in operation.
The NES-D data indicate there were about 30.4 million nonemployer businesses in the U.S., reporting $1.8 trillion in receipts during 2023—of which women owned approximately 12.9 million (42.3%) generating $423 billion in receipts while veterans held about 1.4 million such enterprises accounting for nearly $66 billion.
Other notable findings from nonemployer business statistics include: White owners comprised roughly three-quarters of all such businesses at over 22 million ($1.3 trillion); Hispanic owners ran more than five million ($244 billion); Black or African American owners operated over four million ($129 billion); Asian owners led almost three million ($164 billion); American Indian or Alaska Native owners managed nearly four hundred thousand ($16 billion); while Native Hawaiian/Other Pacific Islander owners held just over one hundred thousand ($4 billion).
This latest release also contains information on urban/rural distribution among business owners as well as legal forms of organization such as sole proprietorships or partnerships.
The NES-D series utilizes administrative records along with decennial census data to link demographic details to nonemployer businesses—defined as those earning at least $1,000 annually that file federal income tax returns.
