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Overall, women-owned businesses account for slighly less than 1/3 of all businesses in the United States, but at first glance the statistics portray a positive picturefor the field's growth: the number of women-owned firms has grown 68 percent since 2007, compared to only 47 percent for all businesses. [http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/04/women-are-owning-more-and-more-small-businesses/390642/]. However, these women owned businesses are typically only run by the woman herself; the Kauffman Foundation reports that among employer firms, women-owned businesses account for only 16% of the total, and their shares of revenue and employees are in the single digits. [http://www.kauffman.org/~/media/kauffman_org/research%20reports%20and%20covers/2014/11/sources_of_economic_hope_womens_entrepreneurship.pdf]

Numbers aside, Americans hold a negative view of women in entrepreneurial leadership roles. According to data from a 2015 Pew Research Center survey, 43% of Americans believe that the U.S. is not prepared to hire women for top-tier executive positions. A relatively smaller, but still significant, number of Americans (23%) believe that women don’t have the time to hold an executive position, given their “family responsibilities”. [http://www.citylab.com/work/2015/09/where-can-female-entrepreneurs-find-the-most-success/406987/] The American public's generally negative perception of women in entrepreneurship presents itself institutionally as well. Even though female founders perform equal to or better than their male counterparts when raising money online, only 10 percent of startups which raised Series A last year had female founders. Today's venture capital environment clocks some 305 active funds over $100 million. These funds collectively put $114 billion to work. 90% of it never sees a female founder. [http://www.inc.com/lisa-calhoun/30-surprising-facts-about-female-founders.html] Texas claims the worst record of supporting women seeking venture capital. Last year, 42 Texas startups got Series A rounds. Zero of them had female founders. Structurally, ninety-four percent of decision makers at venture capital funds are male. But venture capital firms with women partners are more than twice as likely to invest in companies with a woman on the executive team and three times as likely to invest in companies with women CEOs..