# America’s Startup Boom Has a Remote Work Engine

Category: Trending
Published: 2026-07-24
Description: Record business applications show how remote work and AI are helping a new generation of founders build leaner companies with less overhead.
Original URL: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/07/17/business/economy/american-small-business-boom.html
Canonical URL: https://ro.am/rwn/americas-startup-boom-has-a-remote-work-engine

[Interactive bar chart: U.S. business applications, 2005–2025. Summary: Annual totals of non-seasonally adjusted monthly applications for an Employer Identification Number show a sharp and sustained increase after 2019, reaching 5,671,836 in 2025. X-axis: Year. Y-axis: Business Applications. Business Applications: 2005 2485100, 2006 2615834, 2007 2633956, 2008 2559006, 2009 2406259, 2010 2473934, 2011 2550495, 2012 2550198, 2013 2591539, 2014 2691040, 2015 2795897, 2016 2948338, 2017 3182674, 2018 3486829, 2019 3498990, 2020 4356498, 2021 5390816, 2022 5062563, 2023 5469302, 2024 5224176, 2025 5671836. Source: U.S. Census Bureau, Business Formation Statistics — https://www.census.gov/econ/bfs/data.html]

According to [The New York Times](https://www.nytimes.com/2026/07/17/business/economy/american-small-business-boom.html), 5.7 million business applications were filed last year, the most in the two decades the Census Bureau has tracked the data, extending a rebound from a decades-long slump.

## Solopreneurs Lead the Surge

Ernie Tedeschi, chief economist at Stripe, pointed to a jump in solo founders using AI to do work that once required employees.

[Pull quote: “We think that A.I. is actually assisting people with starting their own business.” — Ernie Tedeschi, Chief Economist at Stripe]

Census data backs this up: the growth in applications is concentrated in start-ups unlikely to hire, not ones building teams.

## RWN’s Take

Remote work isn’t just where this boom is happening; it’s what’s fueling it.

The first driver is that remote work proved the model works. Mass layoffs and the 2020 shift to distributed work didn’t just free up people’s time; they showed a business could run productively without a physical office. That proof gave millions of Americans the confidence to build something of their own instead of going back to a desk.

## Compounding Productivity

The second is that remote work and AI are now compounding each other’s productivity gains. Cassidy Winkler built Revel Method Pilates into a four-studio, 65-employee business using ChatGPT as what she calls an indispensable thought partner; the same remote-native, digital-first workflow that made distributed teams productive is what makes a solo founder productive today. A recent [Gusto report](https://gusto.com/resources/gusto-insights/new-business-formation-2026) found 60 percent of founders on its platform used AI last year, with half saying it made starting up cheaper or faster.

## Lean, Remote, Productive by Design

The third is that new companies are now built and distributed from day one, and it’s making them more productive, not less. Arjun Lalwani and Helly Shah launched Ralo, an AI-powered mortgage broker, without hiring an engineering team. They built the product remotely themselves and raised $2.9 million through Y Combinator. Where founders once needed an office and a headcount to get going, remote-first teams are now proving they can out-produce the old model with a fraction of the overhead.