Austin best for small business

​AUSTIN – The Capital City is the best place in the country to start a small business, says the American City Business Journals.

The number of small businesses here grew 9.7 percent between 2010 and 2013. That led the nation by a big margin, as Provo, Utah, came in second with 6.8 percent growth.

The city had 44,162 small businesses in 2013—that’s about 2,342 for every 10,000 residents. The share of jobs in the private sector labor market provided by small businesses was 35.1 percent in 2012.

Additionally, the city’s gross metropolitan market grew 18.2 percent from 2011 to 2014, second only to Dallas nationally.

The study included 106 metros with at least 500,000 residents as of 2014. Other cities ranked in the top five were Miami, Cape Coral-Fort​ Myers, Fla., Sarasota-Bradenton, Fla., and Provo, Utah.

Other Texas cities included in the rankings were Dallas (10), Houston (14), San Antonio (27), and McAllen-Edinburg (35).