Small Businesses Create 2/3 of Jobs in US

[Simply Madeline]

I keep hearing this statistic, but I can't find any information to back it up. Whenever it's tossed out, it's not provided in the context of explaining what criteria must be met for a business to be considered "small". Is it based on sales figures? Number of employees? Single-owner vs. multiple owner? Is the statement even true using any one of these measures?

[mags]

Number of employees, or business receipts.

The Small Business Act states that a small business concern is "one that is independently owned and operated and which is not dominant in its field of operation." The law also states that in determining what constitutes a small business, the definition will vary from industry to industry to reflect industry differences accurately.

What is classified as small, and what I consider small are not the same thing. For example, any business that makes $25M annually (I guess that is gross) is not, IMHO "small". I'll see if I can dredge up figures on the number of jobs "small" businesses create.

ETA: apparently, the statistics come from the SBA itself, they make a yearly report to the president: http://www.sba.gov/advo/research/sbe.html for a page to explain, or http://www.sba.gov/advo/research/rs314.pdf to see 2007's report