Missouri was ranked 11th for small business growth in the February 2017 release of The Paychex IHS Small Business Jobs Index.
The Index is an indicator of the overall economy, providing a monthly, up-to-date measure of change in small business employment. With an index of 100.64, Missouri surpasses other states in the top 20, including Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Massachusetts.
A strong ranking indicates that small businesses have room to thrive as the state’s economy grows, according to the Missouri Department of Economic Development.
Month-to-month changes for the national index have been trending in a positive direction for the past six months, since September. The national index improved 0.39 percent from December to February, the best quarter since early 2014. Currently at 100.78, the national index is signaling positive employment growth, 0.03 percent faster this year versus last.
“Since November, small business job conditions have shown broad-based improvement as all industries and regions have positive three-month growth rates,” said James Diffley, chief regional economist at IHS Markit.
The data for the jobs index comes from a subset of the Paychex client base, approximately 350,000 businesses with less than 50 workers in the U.S.
