UK age demographics of business owners, buyers and sellers

Dyddiad y datganiad:
4 September 2024

FOI reference: FOI-2024-2211

You asked

I am writing to submit a Freedom of Information request regarding the age demographics of UK business owners, buyers and sellers. Specifically, I would like to request three things: 

  1. A percentage breakdown of business owners by age group, ideally in intervals of 5 or 10 years, for the last 5 years is possible. If available, please include details such as industry sector and geographic distribution. 

  2. A percentage breakdown of individuals selling businesses by age group ideally in intervals of 5 or 10 years, for the last 5 years is possible. If available, please include details such as industry sector and geographic distribution. 

  3. A percentage breakdown of individuals buying businesses by age group ideally in intervals of 5 or 10 years, for the last 5 years is possible. If available, please include details such as industry sector and geographic distribution.

We said

Thank you for your query regarding information on business owners, sellers and buyers. 

We do not hold any information that would allow us to produce analysis specifically on the ages of people buying or selling businesses. 

Regarding the owners of businesses, the ONS does not publish any information that answers your request. The nearest equivalent that we publish is a breakdown of the self-employed by age band and region, that can be obtained from our dataset annual population survey - regional - labour market status by age on our Nomis website. 

The Annual Population Survey (APS) can be used to further classify the self-employed by those who are: 

  • paid a salary or wage by an employment agency; 
  • a sole director of their own business; 
  • running a business or professional practice; 
  • a partner in a business or professional practice; 
  • working for themselves; 
  • a sub-contractor; 
  • doing free lance work; or 
  • none of the above. 

However, we do not produce any regular outputs using this more detailed information. 

You can request a tailored analysis to be produced from the Annual Population Survey to meet your specific requirements, by contacting the social survey team at socialsurveys@ons.gov.uk.

There may be a charge for this service, in line with ONS charging policy, depending on the amount of time taken to develop the analysis and undertake quality and disclosure control processes.

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