Small Business

In the United States right now, small, innovative companies are ready to launch clean energy projects that could revolutionize the American auto industry.

They have proven prototypes and business plans to rejuvenate shuttered factories and put people back to work. All they need is the money to begin work. And there’s the rub.

The money is there, but they can’t get it.

Companies that are “too big to fail” have been getting most attention in the bailout packages emerging from the federal government. But in the economic recovery plan now being considered by Congress and the incoming Obama Administration, the focus should be on small businesses.

While the Big Three have been the latest squeaky wheels to get greased by billions of dollars in taxpayer bailout money, small businesses are the real engine of job creation and innovation in the U.S. economy. With a little bit of help, they will be the locomotive that pulls us into the new energy economy of the 21st century.

The US Small Business Administration (SBA) defines small companies as those with fewer than 500 employees. If there are any doubts about their influence on the economy, consider these statistics from the SBA and the U.S. Census:

• Small companies comprise 99.7 percent of all firms with employees in the United States. As of 2004, nearly 7 million small businesses were operating in our economy, employing nearly 60 million workers.
• Small businesses provide half of the jobs in the United States and pay 45 percent of the nation’s private wages. Their total payroll approached $2 trillion in 2004.
• Over the past decade, small companies have created as much as 80 percent of net new jobs in the U.S. economy each year.
• They hire 40 percent of our high-tech workers and produce 13 times more patents per employee than large firms.