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New Report Shows A High Growth Rate Of Women-Owned Businesses In Texas

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A report out this year found the number of women-owned businesses has increased at one and a half times the national average between 1997 and 2014. During that time, Texas saw a 98% percent growth in women-owned businesses – the second highest in the nation behind Georgia.

Michael Cox, the current director of SMU’s O’Neil Center for Global Markets and Freedom and a former chief economist for the Dallas Federal Reserve Bank, says some of what fueled growth for women applied to business owners across the board.

Why Michael Cox thinks Texas saw a high growth rate in women-owned businesses:

A low cost of living…

“Texas has no income tax. Overall, we have the 12th lowest taxes in the nation. Property taxes, sales taxes, and so on.”

Six things are driving a high rate of migration to the state…

“The first is your taxes. The second: Is the state unionized? You know, we want the right to work. They’re leaving for states where the cost of living is low. They’re looking for states where schools are good. And they’re looking for states where the weather is favorable.”

Why a strong majority of women-owned business are solo entrepreneurships…

“Women are choosing professional careers which are predictable – where they know they can be at home with the kids, they won’t be called away to a foreign city for a week and can’t handle the kids responsibility. The same thing’s true of a woman business owner.”

Sam Baker is KERA's senior editor and local host for Morning Edition. The native of Beaumont, Texas, also edits and produces radio commentaries and Vital Signs, a series that's part of the station's Breakthroughs initiative. He also was the longtime host of KERA 13’s Emmy Award-winning public affairs program On the Record. He also won an Emmy in 2008 for KERA’s Sharing the Power: A Voter’s Voice Special, and has earned honors from the Associated Press and the Public Radio News Directors Inc.