NYC Earns 105th Place, Two Neighboring Cities Dead Last
An analysis by the consumer website WalletHub examined the best and worst cities in America to start a small business. Out of 150 metropolitan areas across the United States, New York City placed 105, with Jersey City in 149th place and Newark bringing up the rear at 150. The three top cities, in order, are Shreveport, LA; Tulsa, OK; and Springfield, MO.
WalletHub studied several variables across two categories. For “Access To Resources,” the analysis included small business loan availability, office rental costs, number of local job seekers, and local annual income. For “Business Environment,” the site used corporate taxes, cost of living, length of average workday, percentage of population with a bachelor’s degree, entrepreneurial activity, five-year business survival rate, small businesses per capita, industry variety, and business friendliness. Four of the data points are new additions to the annual list, and WalletHub gleaned information from several public and private sources. New York City’s worst characteristic in the ranking is its extremely high average rent cost, which was only slightly better than most-expensive San Francisco.
What It Means For Small Business
New York City’s independent business owners have long known they are working in a challenging environment, but the study quantifies these difficulties. The rankings did not explicitly include government regulation on small businesses, which likely would have sent the City spiraling further downward.
Additional Reading
The WalletHub analysis received coverage from numerous outlets across the country, including New Jersey Local News, Fortune, the Boston Business Journal, the South Florida Business Journal, Entrepreneur Magazine, the Jacksonville (FL) Business Journal, the Springfield (MO) News-Leader, Deseret (UT) News, and the Florida Times-Union.
Another recent WalletHub study found New York City in the bottom-half of 2015’s best places to find a job (90th place).
