Pennsylvania Region Considered Among Worst Places To Work for a Small Business

A strong and loyal workforce is one of the crucial tools a small business needs for success, and it’s up to the small business owners to keep the employees happy and focused on work. According to a new list released by WalletHub, entrepreneurs in the Scranton area of Pennsylvania have not done a good job creating a positive environment.

As part of National Small Business Week, the personal finance social network conducted an analysis of the best and worst cities in the United States to work for a small business. The Scranton/Wilkes-Barre/Hazleton area of Pennsylvania landed at number 97 on the list, behind Fresno, Calif., and ahead of Toledo, Ohio.

In order to help job seekers consider small businesses as attractive employment prospects, WalletHub examined the small business environment within 100 of the largest U.S. metro areas across 11 key metrics. The data include metrics such as net small business job growth, industry variety and earnings for small business employees.

Two categories fed into the final rankings, Small Business Environment and Economic Environment. The former includes measurements such as number of small businesses, growth of the number of small businesses and earnings for small business employees. The Economic Environment category tracks the unemployment rate of the metro area, median annual income and avaerage number of hours worked.

Scranton landed at 84 for Small Business Environment and 99 for Economic Environment, ending with the 97 place on the list. Pennsylvania regions as a whole did not perform particularly well in the rankings. The highest spot was Harrisburg/Carlisle at number 40, followed by Pittsburgh at 47 and the Philadelphia/Camden/Wilimington region at 48.

The Allentown/Bethlehem/Easton section is the only region left, coming in at 74 on the list, ranked 83rd for small business and 39 for overall economic environment.