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Are fewer women working to launch their own enterprise? A recent study by the Kauffman Foundation finds the percentage of women starting a business last year fell to the lowest level in a dozen years! The entrepreneurial activity rate for women fell from 0.23 percent in 2006 to 0.20 percent in 2007, according to the study, which is based on data collected by the Census Bureau and the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Some observers speculate the credit crunch and lending crisis may be discouraging some women from launching a business. Entrepreneurial activity for men, by contrast, increased from a rate of 0.35 percent in 2006 to 0.41 percent in 2007. That means men were twice as likely as women to start a business in the Kauffman analysis. There is an increase in the overall growth of entrepreneurship in the new analysis. In fact, the Kauffman Index of Entrepreneurial Activity, the only annual study to measure business startup activity for the entire United States adult population at the individual owner level, 495,000 new businesses per month were started in 2007. Overall, 0.30 percent of the U.S. population in the 20-64 age bracket was involved in business startup activity - 300 per 100,000 adults. That's a slight increase from 0.29 percent in 2006.
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