Entrepreneurship has been attracting attention as a
model for rural economic development following
several influential studies showing that new-business
formation is strongly correlated with regional
growth and job creation.1 Some observers see a
focus on rural entrepreneurship as inherently more
cost-effective than traditional business-attraction
efforts and more closely aligned with other development
goals, such as reducing the dependency of
rural communities on a few dominant employers.
Nevertheless, rural areas face challenges
that must be understood before an effective
entrepreneurial climate can be developed.
To gain an understanding of the situation
in rural New England, we can look at the
U.S. Census Bureau’s Statistics of U.S.
Businesses (SUSB) and review recent trends
in new-business creation. The SUSB reports
on the number of independent—that
is, nonsubsidiary—business start-ups by
county and industry for each year between
1998 and 2006. (It excludes nonemployer businesses, private households, certain types of agricultural production, and most government entities.)
Available at: http://works.bepress.com/henry_renski/10/