MAY 15, 2025 — The U.S. Census Bureau today released the 2023 Nonemployer Statistics (NES). NES provides annual subnational economic data about businesses that have no paid employees and are subject to federal income tax with receipts of $1,000 or more ($1 or more for the Construction sector). Receipts comprise the total net revenue a business receives from all sources before deducting expenses, as defined by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), including sales of goods or services sold, income from investments, and fees and commissions.

Number of Nonemployer Establishments and Total Receipts are available by:

• Varying levels of industry detail across 18 sectors, defined by the 2022 North American Industry Classification System (NAICS)
• Varying levels of geography including national, state, metropolitan and micropolitan statistical area, combined statistical area, and county.
• Legal form of organization (national and state only).
• Receipts-size class (national only).

Access:

• NES tables dating back to 2012 are available on data.census.gov.
• Download NES datasets from 1997 to the current reference year (2023).
• Nonemployer Statistics APIs.

The NES data come from business income tax records the IRS provides to the Census Bureau. The majority of all business establishments in the United States are nonemployers. These businesses include some partnerships and corporations, however, the majority of nonemployers are self-employed individuals operating unincorporated businesses (known as sole proprietorships), which may or may not be the owner's principal source of income. To better understand tax filing requirements for businesses with no paid employees,  visit <www.irs.gov/businesses/small-businesses-self-employed/self-employed-individuals-tax-center>.

For more information about Nonemployer Statistics visit <www.census.gov/programs-surveys/nonemployer-statistics/about.html>.

No news release associated with this data product. Tip sheet only.

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