No Employees at Over 76 Percent of Nation's Businesses

The U.S. Census Bureau reports that 76.2 percent of all businesses in the United States pay taxes but have no employees. These companies are found in every sector of the economy and generally consist of self-employed individuals who operate as sole proprietors. 

For some, these businesses are a full-time gig while others use them as a source of supplemental income. Whatever the purpose, the number of non-employer businesses is growing faster than traditional companies. According to the Census Bureau, “The rise in the number of self-employed has altered what people believe a business is.”

All told, there are nearly 7.8 million traditional business establishments employing 127 million workers in the United States. But there are also 24.8 million businesses with no employees.

The largest number of self-employed can be found in real estate, the arts, consulting services, janitorial services, and beauty salons.

In some industries, the self-employed dominate. For example, traditional "employer beauty salons had 435,796 employees in 2016." But at the same time, "there were 730,782 self-employed people in this industry."

In other words, 62.6 percent of the workers were self-employed.

Each weekday, Scott Rasmussen’s Number of the Day explores interesting and newsworthy topics at the intersection of culture, politics, and technology. Columns published on Ballotpedia reflect the views of the author.

Scott Rasmussen is founder and president of the Rasmussen Media Group. He is the author of "Mad as Hell: How the Tea Party Movement Is Fundamentally Remaking Our Two-Party System," "In Search of Self-Governance," and "The People’s Money: How Voters Will Balance the Budget and Eliminate the Federal Debt." Read more reports from Scott Rasmussen — Click Here Now.