Business exit during the COVID-19 pandemic: Non-traditional measures in historical context.

ABSTRACT: Lags in official data releases have forced economists and policymakers to leverage "alternative" or "non-traditional" data to measure business exit resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic. We first review official data on business exit in recent decades to place the alternative measures of exit within historical context. For the U.S., business exit is fairly common, with about 7.5 percent of firms exiting annually in recent years. The high level of exit is driven by very small firms and establishments. We then explore a range of alternative measures of business exit, including novel measures based on paycheck issuance and phone-tracking data, which indicate exit was elevated in certain sectors during the first year of the pandemic. That said, we find many industries have likely seen lower-tha

SUBMITTER: Crane LD 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8938302 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature