Oregon businesses are shutting down faster than new ones are opening, according to the latest federal and state data. That’s a marked departure from historical trends and another signal of how the regional economy has faltered in the years after the pandemic.
Closed businesses outnumbered new establishments by 1,700 in 2024 and by 6,000 in the first nine months of 2025, according to the latest numbers from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Some of the recent closures may be temporary, but it’s the longest sustained imbalance since the Great Recession.
“This aligns with the softer economic and labor market conditions during this period,” said Bingjie Kong, an analyst with the Oregon Employment Department.
“Oregon’s job growth slowed, the unemployment rate edged up, and employer hiring activity weakened,” said Kong, who wrote a new analysis of the numbers last month. “Those signs of cooling labor demand and the economic uncertainty may have made new businesses more hesitant to enter the market.”
The national picture is much healthier, with new establishments handily outpacing closures through the end of 2024 (national business closure data from 2025 isn’t available yet, though the pace of business openings remained consistent.)
Oregon’s economy has struggled throughout this decade. The state’s unemployment rate is No. 3 nationally, at 5.2%, and job growth has been stagnant since 2023 even as the national labor market continued to expand.
Last month, Gov. Tina Kotek’s economic prosperity council recommended tax cuts, regulatory rollbacks and investment in higher education to boost the private sector.
The Democratic governor said she broadly favors the recommendations but hasn’t said what steps she will take to implement them. Kotek’s opponent in November’s gubernatorial election, Republican state Sen. Christine Drazan, endorsed the council’s recommendations and said they deserve bipartisan support.
Historically, Oregon’s rate of business openings and closures has been relatively consistent from year to year. The pandemic introduced a great deal of upheaval, beginning in 2020, with big swings from quarter to quarter.
“The increased volatility after the pandemic recession likely reflects the unusual scale and speed of the COVID-19 disruption,” Kong wrote in an email. “The pandemic brought an unprecedented surge in establishment closures.”
That spate of sudden closures was followed by a sharp rebound in business openings, then a period of sharp volatility in the metric. Business openings were generally above pre-pandemic levels until last summer — but closures rose even faster.
This is Oregon Insight, The Oregonian’s weekly look at the numbers behind the state’s economy. View past installments here.
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