Business Failure Rates Are Declining

Many observers have become alarmed by the spike in business failure rates that occurred during the Great Recession.

Jim Clifton, the CEO of Gallup, saw the rise in business closures as a signal of a decline in American small business. In a worried post published on his company’s blog a year ago, Mr. Clifton wrote, “When small and medium-sized businesses are dying faster than they’re being born, so is free enterprise. And when free enterprise dies, America dies with it.”

Business Failure Rates Are Declining