Small Business Owners Grade Their States for Business Friendliness
Thumbtack.com in partnership with the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, has just released the third annual Small Business Friendliness Survey. More than 12,000 US entrepreneurs participated in the 2014 survey. The Thumbtack.com survey is conducted in the US and obtains data from an extensive, nationwide sample of small business owners. The survey determines friendly business location in referencing multiple cities and states around the country.
The responses of thousands of small business owners indicated that the main ingredients for a pro-growth environment consist of the ease of compliance with tax and regulatory systems and helpful training programs.
Other important findings of the national survey are:
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Most small businesses in Texas, Utah, and Idaho have rated their states in the top five, while California and Rhode Island have been rated in the bottom five every year of the survey.
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The most important regulatory issue in determining a state’s overall friendliness to small business was professional licensing requirement and the ease of filing taxes.
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Small business owners aware of training programs offered by their local/state governments said that their states are very friendly to small business.
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19% of small business respondents said they were prepared for implementation of the Affordable Care Act.
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Female entrepreneurs expressed the opinion that their state governments were friendly to small businesses, whereas many male entrepreneurs have positive views on the outlook of their state economy.
How is Small Business Friendliness in Texas rated in the 2014 survey?
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Texas is rated #1 by small businesses in the country for friendliness of its zoning laws and health and safety regulations.
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Texas is rated second state nationally for the outlook of the state economy relative to the national economy.
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Texas has five of the top ten cities rated by small businesses in this survey: Houston #3, Austin #4, Dallas #6, Fort Worth #7, and San Antonio #8.
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Texas ratings improved from the 2013 survey in all categories except ease of hiring. This dropped from #4 to #5.
- The top rated states were Utah, Idaho, Texas, Virginia and Louisiana. Lowest rated states were Rhode Island, Illinois, California, Connecticut and New Jersey.
