Answer: Applications to start new businesses have increased by 19% in 2020, the fastest growth rate since 2007. 

Questions:

• What types of businesses do you think people are starting now?
•  Do you think it's a good idea to start a business during a recession? [here's 14 successful companies started during a recession]
• What are some of the risks of starting a business? 

Here's the ready-to-go slides for this Question of the Day that you can use in your classroom.

Behind the numbers (Axios): 

Applications for the employer identification numbers that entrepreneurs need to start a business have passed 3.2 million so far this year, compared with 2.7 million at the same point in 2019, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. That group includes gig-economy workers and other independent contractors who may have struck out on their own after being laid off.

Even excluding those applicants, new filings among a subset of business owners who tend to employ other workers reached 1.1 million through mid-September, a 12% increase over the same period last year and the most since 2007, the data show.

“This pandemic is actually inducing a surge in employer business startups that takes us back to the days before the decline in the Great Recession,” said John Haltiwanger, an economist at the University of Maryland who studies the data...The jump may be one sign that the pandemic is speeding up “creative destruction,” the concept popularized by economist Joseph Schumpeter in the 1940s to describe how new, innovative businesses often displace older, less-efficient ones, buoying long-term prosperity.

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Did you know NGPF has an entrepreneurship mini-unit? Check it out here! 

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Feel like a first year teacher again as you learn the new tech tools to teach remotely? Be sure to listen to this podcast from Zach Blattner who shares tips/tricks for teaching remotely. 

About the Author

Tim Ranzetta

Tim's saving habits started at seven when a neighbor with a broken hip gave him a dog walking job. Her recovery, which took almost a year, resulted in Tim getting to know the bank tellers quite well (and accumulating a savings account balance of over $300!). His recent entrepreneurial adventures have included driving a shredding truck, analyzing executive compensation packages for Fortune 500 companies and helping families make better college financing decisions. After volunteering in 2010 to create and teach a personal finance program at Eastside College Prep in East Palo Alto, Tim saw firsthand the impact of an engaging and activity-based curriculum, which inspired him to start a new non-profit, Next Gen Personal Finance.