The Great Ownership Transfer: A new era of business stewardship

At a glance

• A once-in-a-generation wave of ownership transitions is imminent. By 2035, about six million small and medium-size businesses (SMBs) will face ownership transitions as baby boomers retire. More than one million firms are viable candidates for sale, representing up to $5 trillion in enterprise value.
• SMBs are a cornerstone of the US economy. Ninety-nine percent of all companies in the United States are small businesses. They employ more than 60 million workers—nearly half of the US workforce—and generate 35 percent of business revenue. Failed transitions could erase jobs and locally rooted pathways to economic mobility.
• Ownership transition risk is distributed unevenly across geographies. Rural areas are particularly exposed. In some sparsely populated states, small businesses account for more than half of total employment, so failed transitions can stall economic mobility across entire communities.
• Participation gaps represent both a risk and a major wealth-building opportunity. Under current patterns, only 28 percent of transferring value would accrue to women and Black and Latino individuals combined. Closing participation gaps could unlock up to $3 trillion in new household wealth, making ownership transfers one of the most powerful near-term levers to narrow geographic, gender, and race-based disparities in wealth accumulation. 
• A better-functioning ownership transition market could preserve jobs and local prosperity at scale. Effective transitions could keep up to 12 million jobs in place and protect about $250 billion in annual local spending power.

Ideal for policy makers, program officers, government officials, and anyone else in the broader ecosystem who wants to understand topics such as the landscape of business succession, various business segments, downstream challenges. This is the most authoritative source of deeply research and quantitative data on this topic.