Changes

Over the past century, the United States has witnessed two large-scale social trends involving women that have had a significant impact on the country's economic growth. First, huge numbers of women have made their way into the official labor force. Around this time 50 years ago (February 1966), women's labor force participation rate was 39.6%, but in February 2016, 56.8% of women participated in the labor force [https://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/LNS11300002]. This demonstrates substantial growth in women's labor force participation rates. Second, women are achieving a higher degree of education than in years past. As labor market barriers to women have been lowered, the benefits of a college education grew more for women than men, and females outpace males in college enrollment. [http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2014/03/06/womens-college-enrollment-gains-leave-men-behind/]

However, these trends have slowed from their early twenty-first century spikes; room for growth is smaller now than it was before. Economists predict that economic growth from these two trends is unlikely to be repeated to the same magnitude. With this, everyone is looking for the modern-day economy-boosting equivalent to women entering the labor force and achieving higher education. Given the slowing rates of business creation, the long-term pessimism about growth in the United States, and the rising share of women among educated workers, it seems clear that the future of American economic growth is in the hands of women. Encouraging women to enter into fields of entrepreneurship, particularly high-growth entrepreneurship, might be the United State's silver bullet.

This issue brief aims to examine the role of women in entrepreneurship today by examining their jobs (or lack thereof) in entrepreneurship and examine the effectiveness of current policy related to women in entrepreneurship.