As America comes out of the pandemic the small business community still has not recovered. Their revenue is still 32.5% lower than it was last January. Last April it was down 50%, so there has been some rebound, but not as much as you might expect. Most states have had significant reopening by now. Yet small businesses, who tend to have narrow margins in the best of times, are still nowhere near back to normal. The next few months will reveal if this reflects a pandemic that sped up structural changes the favored large businesses, for example using Amazon instead of your local grocer. Or if many small businesses are dependent on office workers and tourism. Odds are both factors are important, and some businesses will have a boom and others will never come back.
Chart courtesy of: Opportunity Insights
Allison Schrager is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute. Follow her on Twitter here.
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