The American ideal of hard-working, innovative people starting businesses to improve their lives persists. The reality is that, in America, the number of new businesses is falling, and has been for over thirty years. As independent banks have been replaced by national financial firms, and as home equity has diminished or disappeared, people are having a tougher time starting new businesses. In previous recoveries, it was the small businesses that generated the majority of the employment growth. Now, prosperity is mainly due to a few, mostly coastal, urban areas hiring service jobs that either pay very well, like programmers, or very poorly like baristas. It takes a long time for many businesses to establish themselves and then grow into contributors to local economies, it may be a decade before the non-urban or non-coastal areas recover. Because very little is being done to address the root causes, the delay may be much longer, or indefinite.
(Click on the graph for the link.)
Pretending Not To Panic 