On December 14, 2020, D.C. Policy Center executive director Yesim Sayin Taylor was quoted by Washington Business Journal:
Yesim Taylor, executive director of the D.C. Policy Center, said the trend in new business applications is the same nationwide, with a dramatic increase in the third quarter. But the D.C., Virginia and Maryland numbers just beat out the national average increase of about 53% over the same quarter last year.
And while it would be easy to attribute the new business formations to higher unemployment — as laid off workers formed their own businesses — there was little correlation between areas of high unemployment and elevated business applications, Taylor said. She said one driver of the increase in applications could be that the costs of starting some businesses is much lower, as many are operating remotely and there is less need for expenditures on items such as office space.
Overall, the spike in applications represents an optimism for the future, she added.
“There is also a lot of pent-up demand,” Taylor said, adding many people have been cooped up at home and just haven’t been spending money on certain expenses, which will change when the pandemic is under control. “It’s not a pretty picture necessarily but at the same time I think people are gearing up for some kind of strong recovery after the main impacts of the pandemic disappear.”