Editorial Staff

Pioneer Launches Report Series Highlighting Massachusetts Job Growth and Business Trends Since 1998

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Report Provides Deeper Insight into Economic Impact of COVID-19

BOSTON – As we learn more about the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on the Bay State’s workforce, it is becoming more important that we deepen our understanding of the state’s economy. Knowledge of local, regional, and state employment and business establishments will be critical for policymakers’ efforts to minimize long-term economic fallout.

A new resource from Pioneer Institute, MassEconomix.org, equips users to take a much closer look at Massachusetts’ businesses by various levels of geography and industry, and explore job and business growth, from the local to the state level.

A new report from Pioneer Institute that draws on data from MassEconomix shows that levels of employment in Massachusetts had surpassed pre-Great Recession levels as of 2018.

In “Some Big, Broad Economic Trends in Massachusetts,” Pioneer analysis of two decades of data shows fluctuating employment changes across the state, as well as firm size information and the largest employers. While the number of jobs and businesses has risen over the years, the average size of Massachusetts firms has decreased.

“Having access to employment data down to the firm level allows us to view aggregated trends more accurately,” said Rebekah Paxton, a research analyst at Pioneer who has worked with the Business Dynamics Research Consortium (BDRC) data since 2018. “These data give us a unique picture of where growth is coming from in the state.”

“Some Big, Broad Economic Trends” analyzes the same Your-economy Time Series data that powers MassEconomix.org, including firm-level employment, industry code, and location information, to develop aggregated numbers for statewide growth. This data is recorded by Infogroup and compiled by the BDRC at the University of Wisconsin System Institute for Business and Entrepreneurship in Madison, Wisconsin.

This report is the first in a series that will present the general employment and business establishment trends in the Commonwealth that can be found using MassEconomix.

In the coming weeks and months, Pioneer will be providing analysis using this data to provide deeper insight on the Massachusetts economy, and specifically into how the COVID-19 pandemic is likely to affect communities and industries within the state.

Pioneer Institute is an independent, non-partisan, privately funded research organization that seeks to improve the quality of life in Massachusetts through civic discourse and intellectually rigorous, data-driven public policy solutions based on free market principles, individual liberty and responsibility, and the ideal of effective, limited and accountable government.

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Visit MassEconomix!

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Pioneer Institute applauds key tax reform provisions advanced by the Speaker and House leadership, including a reduced short-term capital gains tax rate and implementation of a single sales factor apportionment. But leadership must do more to bolster the state’s economic competitiveness and slow out-migration of wealth and business owners that endangers the commonwealth’s economic future.

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Report: Immigrant Entrepreneurs Provide Economic Benefits, but Face Significant Obstacles

Immigrants have started a quarter of all businesses in Massachusetts despite making up just 17 percent of the state workforce, and those establishments appear to be more innovative than those founded by native-born Americans. Despite these contributions, shrinking federal visa caps and red tape are among the factors making it more difficult for immigrants to come to the U.S., according to “Immigrant Entrepreneurs and the Barriers They Face: An Academic Literature Review,” published by Pioneer Institute. 

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Yesterday, voters came closer than many expected to rejecting the largest tax increase in Massachusetts history, even though opponents were dramatically outspent by the unions that bankrolled the amendment to the state Constitution. 

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Study: Legislators Must Answer Key Questions Before Setting Policy for App-Based Rideshare/Delivery Workers

After Massachusetts’ Supreme Judicial Court declared an initiative that was to appear on the November ballot unconstitutional, the issue of how to classify app-based rideshare/delivery workers is back in the hands of the state Legislature.  A new study published by Pioneer Institute distills from the research literature eight questions legislators must answer before determining how to address this fast-growing industry.

Pioneer Institute Expects That Massachusetts Taxpayers Will Be Refunded $3.2B Due To State Revenue Cap

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Survey of Business Sentiment: MA Income Tax Hike Would Lead to Employer Exodus

Nearly three quarters (73 percent) of Massachusetts business leaders think business associates will leave the state if a constitutional amendment appearing on the November ballot to hike taxes is successful, according to a survey conducted by Pioneer Institute.

As States Compete for Talent and Families, Massachusetts Experienced a Six-Fold Increase in Lost Wealth Compared to a Decade Earlier

With competition for businesses and talent heating up across the country, in 2020 Massachusetts shed taxpayers and wealth at a clip six times faster than even just a decade ago. Between 2010 to 2020, Massachusetts’ net loss of adjusted gross Income (AGI) to other states due to migration grew from $422 million to $2.6 billion, according to recently released IRS data now available on Pioneer Institute’s Massachusetts IRS Data Discovery website. Over 71 percent of the loss was to Florida and New Hampshire, both no income tax states.

Book Reveals How Tax Hike Amendment Would Damage Commonwealth’s Economic Competitiveness

If adopted, a constitutional amendment to hike state taxes that will appear on the ballot in November could erase the hard-earned progress Massachusetts has achieved toward economic competitiveness over the last 25 years and may not result in any additional education and transportation funding, according to a new book from Pioneer Institute, entitled Back to Taxachusetts?: How the proposed tax amendment would upend one of the nation’s best economies, which is a distillation of two dozen academic studies.