The effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on entrepreneurship: Is the local entrepreneur the "new normal" workforce?

ABSTRACT

The Covid-19 pandemic has weakened the economy leading to massive unemployment and entire industries being put on lockdown. With millions of Americans either unemployed or underemployed, many turned to new business ventures. Whether starting their own company as an entrepreneur or serving a gig worker on a variety of service platforms, workers found creative ways to either enter or remain in the workforce. Understanding the motivations, opportunities, success rates and outcomes of these new business ventures are important for future entrepreneurs and industry experts. This chapter investigates the role of the gig economy and entrepreneurial activity during the Covid-19 pandemic. A literature review is conducted, and an employment survey of gig workers is conducted and analyzed. Workers' motivations, industry statistics, business funding opportunities, goals of these workers and industry implications are discussed and analyzed. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022. All rights reserved.