Two cheers for small business.

• Author: Dimon, Jamie
• Position: OFF THE NEWS

"We often read that small business is the primary driver of new jobs--this is both incorrect and overly simplistic. Sometimes those net new jobs appear in small businesses, and sometimes they appear in large businesses. In fact, recent studies show that large companies generally are more stable over time and that their employment goes down less during recessions.

One thing we know for sure is that capital expenditures and R&D spending drive productivity and innovation, which, ultimately, drive job creation across the entire economy.

In the United States, the 17,000 large firms account for 80 percent of the $280 billion business R&D spending--and the top 1,000 firms alone account for 50 percent of this amount.

U.S. companies also spend more than $1.4 trillion annually on capital expenditures, and the top 1,000 firms account for 50...