Best Cities for Hispanic Entrepreneurs
Many thanks to Wallet Hub for including Boston University on its expert panel regarding the Business Credit Cards for New Businesses. The interview link is here and I’ve separately pasted in a few of the responses below. They distribute this content to national news outlets throughout the US, as well. Check out the 90-second video above or you can click here to watch it.
2019’s Best Cities for Hispanic Entrepreneurs
By: Adam McCann, Financial Writer
Expect the Hispanic and Latino community’s contributions to the U.S. economy to be nothing short of monumental in the coming decades. Not only is this demographic expected to make up a more than 25% of the U.S. population by 2050 — translating into large buying power — this group is also creating businesses at 15 times the national rate, according to one report.
The timing, therefore, could not be more appropriate for Hispanic entrepreneurs to make their business ideas a reality. But what places have the best conditions for a Hispanic-owned enterprise? To answer that question, WalletHub compared more than 180 U.S. cities across 24 key indicators of business friendliness toward Hispanic entrepreneurs. Our data set of 24 key metrics ranges from Hispanic entrepreneurship rate to median annual income of Hispanics to share of Hispanics with at least a bachelor’s degree. Read on for our findings, expert business insight from a panel of researchers and a full description of our methodology.
Gregory L. Stoller
Senior Lecturer in Strategy and Innovation in the Questrom School of Business at Boston University
What are the biggest challenges faced by Hispanic entrepreneurs?
It’s important to differentiate between non-immigrant and immigrant Hispanic entrepreneurs. Non-immigrant Hispanic entrepreneurs experience the same challenges as any other entrepreneurs. They need to find funding and/or if they are first-time entrepreneurs potentially need to compensate for a lack of credit or poor credit in financing their new ventures.
Immigrant Hispanic entrepreneurs might have additional challenges if they come from a particularly poor country. There are many immigrant entrepreneurs in the United States that can make up a funding gap by leveraging resources or connections from their countries of origin. Immigrant Hispanic entrepreneurs might not have this luxury depending on where they might have been born or grown up.
Should government authorities create programs or other incentives to specifically encourage Hispanic entrepreneurs? If so, what types of programs or incentives?
Spanish is the second most popular language in the United States and Hispanics are increasing in terms of demographic numbers in the US on a regular basis. I believe that the government should fund entrepreneurship regardless of nationality or cultural heritage, but given the increasingly larger percentage of Hispanic entrepreneurs, it only seems natural that associated funding programs should be encouraged and continued. These would include tax breaks for new businesses, access to better labor or reduced regulatory complexity.