Page 107 - INC Magazine-November 2018

DATA CENTER
MINORITY LEADERS

The face of female entrepreneurship is becoming a lot less white. Minority women
control 44 percent of women-owned businesses in the United States, up from 20 percent
in 1997, according to census data and new projections by research firm Womenable—even
though “there’s this notion that we don’t exist,” says Esosa Ighodaro, founder of the social
WOMEN-OWNED BUSINESSES attribute the burst of entrepreneurial activity, led by black and Hispanic women, to
media shopping app CoSign and the networking organization Black Women Talk Tech.
“Entrepreneurship is very lonely, and even lonelier in minority communities.” Researchers

both educational progress and economic necessity. “Women have been taking control,
frankly, for centuries,” says Kathy McShane of the Small Business Administration’s Office
7 MILLION of Women’s Business Ownership. “But now we’re talking about it.” � MICHELLE CHENG

White women have historically
made up the largest group of
6 MILLION female entrepreneurs ...

5 MILLION

... but in the past five years, the
number of businesses they own has
flattened—while black and Hispanic
4 MILLION WHITE women are closing the gap.

3 MILLION

COLLEGE HELPS Among black people, women
2 MILLION earn 64 percent of all bachelor’s degrees.

1 MILLION GENDER PAY GAP? Start your own thing—a Hispanic
woman earns 58 cents for every white man’s dollar.

BLACK
HISPANIC
ASIAN SOURCES: 1997, 2007, AND 2012 FROM THE U.S. CENSUS BUREAU’S SURVEY OF BUSINESS OWNERS (SBO); 2013 TO
0 OTHER*
1997 2007 // 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2016 FROM WOMENABLE FORECASTS BASED ON SBO DATA FROM 2002, 2007, AND 2012.
*American Indians, Alaska Natives, Native Hawaiians, and Indigenous Pacific Islanders
FINANCIAL FOCUS FAMILY PLANNING TAKING CHARGE
Men still get the vast majority of venture “I’m trying to make a better life As a minority, “you grow up knowing you
capital—but an uptick in female-focused for my kids in the future,” says have to work for everything you have,”
funds is “encouraging women of color to enter Vandra Caldwell, a single mother says Junea Rocha, who co-founded Brazi
the field,” says Miriam Rivera, co-founder of three and co-founder of Mixins Bites, a 2018 Inc. 500 honoree based in
of Palo Alto, California–based Ulu Ventures. Rolled Ice Cream in Omaha. Portland Oregon, to control “my own destiny.”

2 8 ● I N C . ● N O V E M B E R 2 0 1 8 ● ● ● D ATA V I S U A L I Z AT I O N B Y K R I S T I N L E N Z