In real numbers most businesses in the US are "small businesses" because they have 500 or fewer employees. It says nothing about their financials though. A hedge fund managing billions of dollars, a start up with millions in VC funding, and a mom and pop florist are all "small businesses".

I'm definitely not disagreeing "small business" has been turned into a propaganda term. That process was helped by the silly tax classification of what's a "small business". A lot of marketing dollars go into making people think the mom and pop florist when they hear the term and not the hedge fund.