Bernanke urged banks to loosen lending to smaller companies at a Fed conference Monday, saying that small businesses employ about half of all Americans and account for 60 percent of job creation.

Startups are especially vital, Bernanke said. Over the past 20 years, startup businesses accounted for about a quarter of all job creation.

Meanwhile, big companies are building up their cash reserves and are expected to report strong earnings in the coming week, said the Associated Press.

According to the National Federation of Independent Businesses, roughly one-third of small businesses seeking credit have had trouble getting it. Banks counter that the demand for credit remains weak.

Several big banks, including Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase and Citigroup, have pledged to increase small business lending this year. Total lending to small businesses has continued to decline, however, dropping from around $710 billion in the second quarter 2008 to less than $670 billion in the first quarter of this year, said the AP.

A number of small business owners say they are relying on personal credit cards or dipping into their own savings to stay afloat.

And it’s in the form of successful entrepreneurship, everything from shoestring-budget start-ups to major viral marketing coups by tiny companies.

Recession be damned, some entrepreneurs are not only doing well, they are doing exceptionally well, wrote Jill Priluck of MSNBC’s “The Big Money” on March 17.

“With less overhead, a slim-to-none bureaucracy, and a philosophy that goes against even the most innovative Fortune 500 game plan, little guys in industries such as finance, marketing, entertainment, and media are busy, some more than ever, and a few are moving into territory where the big fish can’t swim. Whether making deals, planning ad campaigns, or signing talent, all small fish have the same slogan: lighter, cheaper, faster,” she wrote. “Welcome to the Little-Guy Economy, where boutique investment banks make deals while big finance is frozen, where Web geeks field calls from big media and corporate clients who need viral video and other digital-branding tools, where small law firms prosper and laid-off lawyers open their own shops, where independent music labels innovate faster, and where the word “team” can have a whole new meaning.”

Finance is perhaps the most interesting example, where small firms are playing a strong hand, particularly in the credit markets, where huge loans are history.

“While firms like Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase depend on freely flowing credit markets, boutique firms, which do smaller deals, rely more on private equity sponsors—and don’t have the same bank, credit, or securitization obligations,” Priluck wrote.

If small is in, then it doesn’t take long for some bigger fish to swim over and take a look.

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg — as big a billionaire as there is — is now looking to spearhead small business and entrepreneurship in the financial services sector, Priluck wrote.

Video producers Lindsey Johnson and Leo Borovskiy of Lush Life Productions know how it is to make it big when your administrative assistant is your voice mailbox.

They turned a viral marketing jackpot and YouTube sensation “The Chad” into a thriving business that today includes clients like Hearst Digital, Priluck wrote.

“We’ve gone from only working for advertising agencies and marketing companies to having corporations directly approach us with their brands and ask, ‘What can you do and how much can you do it for?” Johnson told Priluck.