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Mapped: The State of Small Business Recovery in America

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Small Business Recovery

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Mapped: The State of Small Business Recovery in America

In the business news cycle, headlines are often dominated by large corporations, macroeconomic news, or government action.

While mom and pop might not always be in focus, collectively small businesses are a powerful and influential piece of the economy. In fact, 99.9% of all businesses in the U.S. qualify as small businesses, collectively employing almost half (47.3%) of the nation’s private workforce.

Unfortunately, they’ve also been one of the hardest-hit sectors of the economy amid the pandemic. From the CARES Act to the new budget proposal, billions of dollars have been allocated towards helping small businesses to get back on their feet.

Small Business Recovery in 50 Metro Areas

During the pandemic, many small businesses have either swiftly pivoted to survive, or struggled to stay afloat. This map pulls data from Opportunity Insights to examine the small business recovery rate in 50 metro areas across America.

So, has the situation improved since the last time we examined this data? The short answer is no—on a national scale, 34% of small businesses are closed compared to January 2020.

San Francisco is one of the most affected metro areas, with a 48% closure rate of small businesses. New York City has spiralled the most since the end of September 2020.

U.S. Metro Area% Change in # of
Small Businesses Open
(As of Sep 25, 2020)
% Change in # of
Small Businesses Open
(As of Apr 23, 2021)
7-month change (p.p.)
Albuquerque-23%-34%-11
Atlanta-26%-35%-9
Austin-32%-38%-6
Bakersfield-31%-35%-4
Baltimore-28%-35%-7
Boston-33%-47%-14
Charlotte-18%-28%-10
Chicago-27%-38%-11
Cleveland-26%-34%-8
Colorado Springs-23%-28%-5
Columbus-21%-28%-7
Dallas-Fort Worth-21%-28%-7
Denver-25%-29%-4
Detroit-28%-38%-10
El Paso-25%-26%-1
Fresno-26%-30%-4
Honolulu-41%-25%+16
Houston-30%-34%-4
Indianapolis-25%-34%-9
Jacksonville-18%-28%-10
Kansas City-15%-26%-11
Las Vegas-22%-30%-8
Los Angeles-27%-34%-7
Louisville-23%-35%-12
Memphis-21%-24%-3
Miami-23%-34%-11
Milwaukee-22%-27%-5
Minneapolis-21%-29%-8
Nashville-21%-26%-5
New Orleans-45%-39%+6
New York City-21%-42%-21
Oakland-32%-35%-3
Oklahoma City-26%-35%-9
Philadelphia-24%-31%-7
Phoenix-19%-31%-12
Portland-34%-36%-2
Raleigh-16%-29%-13
Sacramento-33%-34%-1
Salt Lake City-18%-23%-5
San Antonio-34%-40%-6
San Diego-28%-38%-10
San Francisco-49%-48%+2
San Jose-35%-44%-9
Seattle-28%-30%-2
Tampa-22%-40%-18
Tucson-27%-28%-1
Tulsa-23%-32%-9
Virginia Beach--36%0
Washington DC-37%-47%-10
Wichita-15%-28%-13

Data as of Apr 23, 2021 and indexed to Jan 4-31, 2020.

On the flip side, Honolulu has seen the most improvement. As travel and tourism numbers into Hawaii have steadily risen up with lifted nationwide restrictions, there has been a 16 p.p. increase in open businesses compared to September 2020.

Road to a K-Shaped Recovery

As of April 25, 2021, nearly 42% of the U.S. population has received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine. However, even with this rapid vaccine rollout, various segments of the economy aren’t recovering at the same pace.

Take for instance the stark difference between professional services and the leisure and hospitality sector. Though small business revenues in both segments have yet to return to pre-pandemic levels, the latter has much more catching up to do:

Small Business Recovery Supplemental - Business Revenues

This uneven phenomena is known as a K-shaped recovery, where some industries see more improvement compared to others that stagnate in the aftermath of a recession.

The Entrepreneurial Spirit Endures

Despite these continued hardships, it appears that many Americans have not been deterred from starting their own businesses.

Many small businesses require an Employer Identification Number (EIN) which makes EIN applications a good proxy for business formation activity. Despite an initial dip in the early months of the pandemic, there has been a dramatic spike in EIN business applications.

ein business applications

Even in the face of a global pandemic, the perseverance of such metrics prove that the innovative American spirit is unwavering, and spells better days to come for small business recovery.

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Will Tesla Lose Its Spot in the Magnificent Seven?

We visualize the recent performance of the Magnificent Seven stocks, uncovering a clear divergence between the group’s top and bottom names.

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Will Tesla Lose Its Spot in the Magnificent Seven?

This was originally posted on our Voronoi app. Download the app for free on iOS or Android and discover incredible data-driven charts from a variety of trusted sources.

In this graphic, we visualize the year-to-date (YTD) performance of the “Magnificent Seven”, a leading group of U.S. tech stocks that gained prominence in 2023 as the replacement of FAANG stocks.

All figures are as of March 12, 2024, and are listed in the table below.

RankCompanyYTD Change (%)
1Nvidia90.8
2Meta44.3
3Amazon16.9
4Microsoft12
5Google0.2
6Apple-6.7
7Tesla-28.5

From these numbers, we can see a clear divergence in performance across the group.

Nvidia and Meta Lead

Nvidia is the main hero of this show, setting new all-time highs seemingly every week. The chipmaker is currently the world’s third most valuable company, with a valuation of around $2.2 trillion. This puts it very close to Apple, which is currently valued at $2.7 trillion.

The second best performer of the Magnificent Seven has been Meta, which recently re-entered the trillion dollar club after falling out of favor in 2022. The company saw a massive one-day gain of $197 billion on Feb 2, 2024.

Apple and Tesla in the Red

Tesla has lost over a quarter of its value YTD as EV hype continues to fizzle out. Other pure play EV stocks like Rivian and Lucid are also down significantly in 2024.

Meanwhile, Apple shares have struggled due to weakening demand for its products in China, as well as the company’s lack of progress in the artificial intelligence (AI) space.

Investors may have also been disappointed to hear that Apple’s electric car project, which started a decade ago, has been scrapped.

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