Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

The Small Business Index shows two measures of the small business economy: employment and revenue.

Employment, tracked in the US, Canada, and the UK, shows how many people are currently employed by small businesses and the monthly growth rate. In the UK, the Index also shows the total number of job vacancies at small businesses and the monthly growth rate. All employment data is available at the national, regional, and sector level. In the US, the Index also tracks small business employment in 20 states.

Revenue, tracked in the US only, shows how much revenue small businesses generate and the monthly growth rate. All US revenue data is available nationally, regionally, by sector, and for 20 states.

The Small Business Index fills significant gaps in economic data. The 2023 Intuit QuickBooks Small Business Index Annual Report shows that 98% of US employers are small businesses (with less than 100 employees), while in Canada and the UK, this rises to 99%. But up-to-date data on the current health of small businesses is scarce. If small businesses are under- or misrepresented in economic data reports, they are less likely to get the support they need to succeed. By developing the Index, Intuit QuickBooks wants to help all small businesses grow and prosper by highlighting the challenges and opportunities they face.

The robust methodology stands out from other reports in the market by using official statistics for calibration, focusing exclusively on small businesses, eliminating publication delays, and benefiting from a large sample of small businesses that use QuickBooks to manage their businesses. Unlike some small business indexes, it does not rely exclusively on survey data. Instead, anonymous QuickBooks Payroll records are aggregated and adjusted against official government statistics before publication using economic models developed by Professor Akcigit and his international team of independent economists. This means the Index can provide a near real-time reflection of hiring and employment in the small business economy.

When the Small Business Index talks about a "small business," it means a business with less than 10 employees in the US and UK, and a business with less than 20 employees in Canada.

In the US and the UK, the Index tracks businesses with 1 to 9 employees because this is the best match between Intuit QuickBooks data and official statistics from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and Office for National Statistics. In Canada, the Index tracks businesses with 1 to 19 employees, which matches with official statistics from Statistics Canada.

No. The Small Business Index is not a reflection of QuickBooks’ customers. The Index uses economic models to understand what’s happening across small businesses in the US, Canada, and the UK. These models use official statistics to adjust anonymous QuickBooks customer data, making the data reflect trends in the general small business population. By using anonymous, aggregated, adjusted data, the Index also protects the privacy of QuickBooks customers.

Until 2015, Intuit published a previous instance of the Small Business Index to show small business employment and revenue trends. The major differences between the new Index and the previous version are that the new Index covers the UK and Canada as well as the US and uses an updated methodology. The current methodology was developed by a different team of economists who were chosen for their expertise and familiarity with the economies of the US, Canada, and the UK.

The sample sizes in the Small Business Index are large—especially in the US and Canada, where QuickBooks is a leading solution for small businesses. Samples are likely to grow over time and may fluctuate because they depend on businesses using the QuickBooks Payroll platform. The sample also requires statistical adjustment to ensure the Index truly reflects broad employment and job vacancy changes rather than trends only in the QuickBooks customer base.

For the Employment Index, the monthly total is currently at least 557,000 small businesses:

• 444,000 small businesses in the US with 1 to 9 employees
• 87,000 small businesses in Canada with 1 to 19 employees
• 26,000 small businesses in the UK with 1 to 9 employees

For the Revenue Index, the monthly total is currently at least 300,000 small businesses in the US.

To measure monthly fluctuations in small business employment, the Small Business Index uses anonymous payroll data from QuickBooks customer accounts. For its monthly measure of average small business revenue, the Index uses anonymous data from QuickBooks Payroll customers with linked bank accounts in QuickBooks Online. Rigorous data privacy safeguards means individual businesses are never identified (more info on Intuit’s privacy practices can be found here).

After small businesses run payroll or record revenue from sales in their QuickBooks accounts, the data is anonymized then adjusted using government statistics to reflect all small businesses of equivalent size and finally aggregated by country, region, sector, or state before publication.

In addition to anonymous QuickBooks data, the following official data sources are used to ensure the Index is nationally representative of small business employment and revenue:

• US: Business Employment Dynamics and Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (source: Bureau of Labor Statistics) and the Statistics of US Businesses (source: US Census Bureau)
• Canada: Labour Force Survey (source: Statistics Canada)
• UK: Job Vacancy Survey (source: Office for National Statistics) and Business Population Estimates (source: Department for Business and Trade)

• For both the US and Canada, the Index uses the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) to define the sectors and industries within them.
• For the UK, the Index uses the Standard Industrial Classification (SIC) to define sectors and industries.

Find out how these official data sources are used by reading the Index's complete methodology.

On the Small Business Index's dashboard, you may notice that the monthly increase in total employment or job vacancies sometimes differs from the corresponding monthly growth rate. This is by design. It’s caused by regular updates to the official government statistics that are used to make the Index nationally representative and to calculate its monthly estimates of the number of jobs or vacancies at small businesses.

To fully explain why this happens, we need to look at how the Index works. Every month, the Index calculates a monthly growth rate (as a percentage) for small business employment (or job vacancies) by country, region, and sector. In order to translate these percentages into the actual number of jobs/vacancies gained or lost, the growth rates are multiplied by the corresponding number of jobs/vacancies at small businesses in the previous month. Whenever new official statistics are released, the Index’s estimates for the number of jobs/vacancies at small businesses are also revised. This ensures the Index always uses the most accurate, up-to-date information available but sometimes causes differences between the monthly increase in total employment and the corresponding monthly growth rate.

How often this happens depends on whether you are looking at the Index data for the US, Canada, or the UK. Official statistics are published at different frequencies in each country. For example, in the US, the Business Employment Dynamics (BED) are refreshed every 2 to 4 months to add new months of data and revise older data when corrections are needed. In Canada and the UK, the corresponding official statistics, which are based on surveys, are refreshed every 1 to 2 months. In the US, the BED uses administrative data from unemployment insurance records, not survey data (similarly, the Index is based on administrative data from QuickBooks customer payroll records). The BED is highly accurate but has a 6 to 9 month time lag—so data released in July 2024 is only available through December 2023. In comparison, when the Index is published, the latest available data is just a few days old—so data released at the beginning of July 2024 is available through June 2024.

Yes. All data published in the Intuit QuickBooks Small Business Index—including employment, job vacancies, and revenue—is seasonally adjusted. This removes the impact of regular seasonal growth patterns which can, for example, create significant increases in employment or revenue during peak seasons. If the Index shows significant growth in employment or revenue during a peak season, this is above what’s usually expected at this time of year. Read more about this in the methodology.

Yes. All revenue data published in the Intuit QuickBooks Small Business Index is adjusted for inflation. This removes the impact of inflation-related price increases on the Index by deflating all revenue values to 2017 dollars. For example, average real revenue per US small business in September 2024 was $52,000 in 2017 dollars, which is equivalent to $63,800 per business in 2024 dollars. Read more about this in the methodology.

The Small Business Index lives on the QuickBooks Blog. Use the links below to explore the data insights:

• Dashboard with interactive data visualizations—including heat maps and line charts—with data insights available by country, region, and sector.
• Monthly posts with the latest employment insights for small businesses in the US, Canada, and the UK—and the latest revenue insights for small businesses in the US.
• Quarterly reports published every January, April, July, and October with a deeper dive into regional and industry trends for Q1 (January to March), Q2 (April to June), Q3 (July to September), and Q4 (October to December) every year.
• Annual reports published every fall with a comprehensive analysis of small business trends and what's been driving them over the past 12 months.
• Methodology showing how the Index works, which data sources are used, and how the calculations are made to produce rigorous, reliable results every month.
• Publication calendar with future release dates for all monthly, quarterly, and annual publications as soon as these dates are confirmed. Dates may be subject to change without notice.
• About the team with biographies and headshots of Professor Akcigit and the team of economists who helped to develop the Index methodology and economic models.

The Small Business Index is updated every month, usually in the first week of the month, with data insights from the previous month. The updates are published in monthly blog posts for the US, Canada, and the UK and added to the main Index dashboard at the same time. The dashboard has all of the data insights for each country, region, and sector. Note that in the US and Canada, the Index is updated a few days earlier than in the UK due to different payroll schedules.

Get a full list of publication dates here.

All of the data insights from the Small Business Index can be found right here on the QuickBooks blog. 

Data insights are also shared in press releases, in media interviews and articles, on Intuit's blog, at events, in speeches, in regular emails to policymakers and QuickBooks customers, in social media posts, and beyond to ensure the information is made as widely available as possible.

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The Small Business Index will be free to access on the QuickBooks Blog for the foreseeable future without any subscription requirements or data collection. The only time we ask for your data is if you want to subscribe to receive our monthly Index updates.

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Intuit gathers critical data from hundreds of thousands of QuickBooks customer accounts to create the Small Business Index. To ensure the Index accurately reflects the national small business economies in the US, Canada, and the UK, Intuit commissioned an international team of independent economists led by Professor Ufuk Akcigit to develop purpose-built economic models that power the Index. All data processing is done by Intuit analysts according to strict privacy guidelines and procedures.

Ufuk Akcigit is the Arnold C. Harberger Professor of Economics at the University of Chicago. He is an elected Research Associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research, Center for Economic Policy Research, and the Center for Economic Studies, and a Distinguished Research Fellow at Koc University. Alongside a team of other leading economists, he developed the economic models that use QuickBooks data to create the Small Business Index.

Read more about Professor Ufuk Akcigit.

Professor Ufuk Akcigit is a leading economist specializing in small business innovation, entrepreneurship, macroeconomics, and firm dynamics—and is the winner of multiple awards and accolades. Intuit decided to collaborate with him because he shares our love for small businesses and our desire to help them succeed. The professor brings the international expertise and resources required to help Intuit launch a high-frequency small business index in the US, Canada, and UK.