Small businesses are the lifeblood of the US economy. They power, grow, and local communities in every one of the nation’s 50 states.
But how are workers at these small businesses being rewarded for their efforts?
That question kicked off this latest study from the OnDeck team. It analyzed a ton of data from the US Census Bureau to see which US states and metro areas have the highest average salaries for small business workers.
Let’s take a look at the results.
The state where small businesses pay the highest and lowest wages.
There’s some big money to be made in working for small businesses in the state of Massachusetts. The Bay State has the best average salary for workers at small businesses, with the average employee taking home over $72,000 per year. This may have something to do with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), one of the world’s leading research universities. It attracts the smartest talent from all over the world. And after graduation, many remain in the state to set up small startups or exciting new ventures.
On the flip side, there’s Mississippi. The average annual salary for workers at small businesses in this state is just under $40,000; that’s $20,000 less than the national average.
Metro areas with the highest and lowest average salaries for small business employees
Massachusetts makes another appearance on the list of average salaries for small business workers in US metro areas. The Boston-Cambridge-Newton metro area is a great place for employees working at small businesses. The Ondeck data shows that, on average, they earn a salary of $78,000; that’s the second-highest average small business salary in any US metro area.
The top spot belongs to the San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara metro area in California. Its small business employees are living very comfortably on their $96,000 salaries.
That figure might make a few small business workers in Tucson feel a tinge of pay envy. The Arizona metro area is right at the bottom of this chart, with the average small business worker making ‘just’ $45,000. That’s less than half the average salary of their small business counterparts in San Jose.
Pay for small business workers in mid-sized metro areas
The Durham-Chapel Hill metro area in North Carolina is decidedly mid-sized. It covers around 2,290.2 square miles and has a population of just over 600,000. And this mid-sized metro area produces some distinctly mid-sized salaries for small business workers: the average take-home annual pay comes at just under $60,000. Not great. Not terrible. In Gen Z parlance, it’s just ‘mid.’
Sticking with the Gen Z slang, small business workers in the McAllen-Edinburg metro area are ‘taking an L on the daily.’ The average salary for employees at small businesses in the Texan metro area is a low $33,000.
Small metro areas with big wages for small business workers
Sitting halfway between El Paso and Fort Worth, the Midland metro area is one of the smaller metro areas in Texas and the entire USA. However, there is still some big money to be made for the area’s small business employees. They’re earning nearly $70,000 a year, according to the OnDeck research.
But Texas also has the smallest metro area with the lowest salary. It’s Eagle , where workers at small businesses can expect to earn under $29,000 for a year’s worth of work.
