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Kevin Abourezk
ICT

The number of American Indian and Alaska Native-owned businesses in the United States declined by more than 2 percent from 2021 to 2022, though those businesses enjoyed a 44 percent increase in receipts, an 8 percent increase in employees and a 13 percent increase in employee payroll, according to U.S. Census Bureau estimates released Thursday.

The bureau’s 2023 Annual Business Survey, which covers reference year 2022, showed there were 47,519 American Indian and Alaska Native-owned businesses that year with $78.5 billion in receipts, 333,153 employees and about $14.6 billion in annual payroll in 2022.

The survey also found that the number of Native Hawaiian and other Pacific Islander-owned businesses increased by nearly 15 percent from 2021 to 2022, from 8,324 to 9,552. Those businesses saw a more than 31 percent increase in receipts from $10.5 billion to $13.8 billion, a 29 percent increase in employees from 53,277 to 68,795, and a 28 percent increase in annual payroll from $2.5 billion to $3.2 billion.

Overall, the Annual Business Survey found that the number of U.S. businesses from 2021 to 2022 held steady at 5.9 million, while minority-owned businesses increased 8 percent from 1.2 million to 1.3 million, veteran-owned businesses declined by 10 percent from 304,823 to 273,542, and women-owned businesses remained around 1.3 million.

Other findings from the Annual Business Survey include:

  • Veteran-owned businesses had an estimated $884.5 billion in receipts, 3.2 million employees, and $179.7 billion in annual payroll.
  • Women-owned businesses had an estimated $2.1 trillion in receipts, 11.4 million employees, and $508.5 billion in annual payroll.
  • There were an estimated 650,680 Asian-owned businesses in the United States in 2022, an estimated 144,141 (22.2 percent) of them were in the Accommodation and Food Services sector. Asian-owned businesses had the largest estimated receipts ($1.2 trillion) among minority race groups.
  • There were an estimated 194,585 Black or African American-owned businesses with $211.8 billion in annual receipts, 1.6 million employees, and about $61.2 billion in annual payroll. About 49,872 (25.6 percent) of them were in the Health Care and Social Assistance sector.
  • The number of Hispanic-owned businesses grew about 14.6 percent from 406,086 in 2021 to 465,202 in 2022 and made up about 7.9 percent of all U.S. businesses with an estimated $653.5 billion in annual receipts, 3.6 million employees, and approximately $143.2 billion in annual payroll.

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Kevin Abourezk is a longtime, award-winning Sicangu Lakota journalist whose work has appeared in numerous publications. He is also the deputy managing editor for ICT. Kevin can be reached at kevin@ictnews.org.