Respect to Lina Khan. She Sees What Most Democrats Still Don’t.

In her recent New York Times essay, Lina Khan issues a powerful critique of how monopolistic corporate consolidation and decades of policy drift have hollowed out the role of small business in Democratic politics. She offers not nostalgia but a forward‑looking strategy grounded in economic justice, listening, and structural accountability.

Ms. Khan reminds readers that the Democratic coalition once relied on small business, working people, and farmers as pillars of economic power—not ornaments. She references the Roosevelt era as a time when those groups had influence in policymaking. She also points to the Clinton years as when the pursuit of scale and deregulation began to reshape the economy, making national chains, big banks, and tech platforms the default beneficiaries while small local operators were squeezed out.

During her tenure as chair of the Federal Trade Commission, Ms. Khan heard from pharmacists, grocers, franchisees, and startup founders not to lobby for favors but to request protection from abusive practices. They described noncompete agreements that blocked mobility, opaque platform fees that prevented fair access to markets, gag clauses that silenced franchisees, and contracting rules that locked them out of competition. She responded with actual policy: banning many noncompetes (a rule later blocked), challenging platform tollbooths, enforcing clear subscription cancellation rules, and prohibiting gag clauses that prevented franchisees from speaking about mistreatment.

Her essay highlights Zohran Mamdani’s New York City mayoral campaign as an example of the politics she advocates. Mamdani built trust by speaking directly with halal cart operators, bodegas, and small storefront owners. He asked what rent, regulation, and survival looked like for them. He listened. He engaged without photo ops. He built a platform rooted in their day‑to‑day realities.

It is worth considering the scale and importance of small business in today’s economy. In 2025 there are approximately 34.8 million small businesses in the United States, making up 99.9 percent of all firms. These companies employ nearly half of the private sector workforce and generate about 64 percent of net new jobs. They contribute roughly 43.5 percent of U.S. GDP.

This entire category of businesses is currently growing too. Business formation applications in mid‑2025 are projected to bring roughly 28,400 new employer firms into existence within four quarters—on pace for another 1 to 2 percent annual increase in active small enterprises.

Given current trends, including accelerated business formation and optimism among owners, projections suggest that by 2027 the United States could see well over 36 million small enterprises operating—rising toward 37 million by 2030 if formation rates and survival remain steady.

Those numbers signal more than scale. They mark a shift in how work and livelihoods are organized in the era of AI. As more middle‑class jobs in content, coordination, customer service, and administration become automated, many displaced workers are pivoting into entrepreneurship. They are launching microbrands, online services, remote consultancies, tutoring collectives, ghost kitchens, and one‑person agencies. They do not have investors or board seats. They have grit and necessity. They also represent the next wave of economic and political rebuilding if the Democratic Party actually shows up with support and protection.

Ms. Khan’s article is effectively a roadmap. It says that real policy to defend small business—including antitrust enforcement, fair capital access, algorithmic transparency, portable health care, and protections against predatory contracts—must be central to any serious rebuilding of trust. Without such a shift, Democrats will continue to lose credibility with the people who are literally creating tomorrow’s economy.

Respect to Lina Khan for seeing this clearly and saying it out loud. The real question is who else in the party will have the wisdom and the courage to follow her lead.

• Ray

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Sources

U.S. small business counts, share of businesses, job creation, and GDP data:

Projected new employer business formations (June 2025):

Khan’s FTC actions and the politics of small business outreach:

Zohran Mamdani campaign small business engagement: ()