Home-based Businesses Show Rapid Increase

 

"When I had small children at home," recalls Toni L. Goldfarb, of Teaneck, N.J., the editor and publisher of Medical Abstracts Newsletter, "I used to commute to New York to work. Now, years later, I've found that not only can I work at home, but I can run a business from here as well."

Goldfarb is one of millions of women who base their businesses at home. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, female self-employment increased from 1,475,000 in 1972 to 2,102,000 in 1979, a rate of increase more than four times that of male self-employment during that same period. The BLS says the number of self-employed women jumped to 2,334,000 by August 1981.

Entrepreneurial women, says Wendy Lazar of the New Jersey-based National Alliance of Homebased Businesswomen, "are doing everything at home." A survey she and colleague Marion Behr conducted found women employed at home in over 150 occupations, from accounting to moped-testing. "We have an Alliance member in Denver," says Lazar, "who sews clerical vestments and church wall hangings. We have some women who prepare fancy box lunches, and others who are health food caterers, home builders, and book-keepers. There are two women who own a fire engine and use it for a limousine service."

Most women who've joined the Alliance, reports Lazar, give numerous reasons for basing their businesses at home. "One common reason is that they can stay home with their children," she says, "but there's more to the decision to work at home than that." Lazar points to the convenience of home-based businesses. The hours are flexible, there's no need to commute, and those who don't see clients don't have to go to the expense of buying a business wardrobe.

Although the average income of home-based businesswomen is low, between $5,000 and $10,000 per year, Lazar says that most women feel that working at home "gives them the best of both worlds. They are working in the business world, but still maintaining their home and family life."

Lazar, with partner Marion Behr, started up the Alliance in 1980, and its ranks keep growing. "It's almost like we're the silent majority of businesswomen," says Goldfarb, a member of the Alliance. "There are so many of us working at home, and yet we haven't been truly recognized as professionals."