Preliminary analysis prepared independently by House Strategies Group LLC from public data. Not affiliated with or endorsed by the City of Boston. Figures illustrate analytical approach and are subject to revision with primary data. Not a procurement-disparity finding.

Module · Market availability

Who is in the market

Availability is the denominator of every disparity index: the share of ready, willing, and able firms owned by each demographic group. This page shows two lenses side by side: the U.S. Census Annual Business Survey count of employer firms in the Boston market, and the 2020 study's dollar-weighted custom-census availability. They measure different things, and a rigorous study needs both.

Metro employer firms
100,712
ABS 2022, CBSA 14460
Minority-owned
15.4%
15,505 firms
Women-owned
20.2%
20,303 firms
Veteran-owned
3.3%
3,299 firms

Availability by owner group (ABS lens)

Share of all employer firms in the Boston-Cambridge-Newton metro, 2022

Source: U.S. Census Annual Business Survey, Company Summary 2022 (CBSA 14460). Retrieved 2026-07-28.

The 2020 study's availability (custom-census lens)

Dollar-weighted share of City contract dollars each group was available to perform, FY2015-19

Source: 2020 City of Boston Disparity Study (BBC Research & Consulting), figure ES-1.

Why the two lenses differ, and why that matters
The ABS counts every employer firm once. The 2020 study weighted availability by the dollars and types of work the City actually buys, then verified willingness and ability by survey. Women-owned firms are 20.2 percent of metro employer firms but were 11.2 percent of dollar-weighted availability; Black-owned firms are 2.4 percent of employer firms but 3.6 percent of dollar-weighted availability. Neither number is wrong. The gap between the lenses is itself analytic material: it shows where firm counts and contract-dollar opportunity diverge, which is exactly what a defensible availability re-measurement must reconcile.

Availability by industry cluster

Minority-, women-, Black-, and Asian-owned share of firms within each procurement-relevant cluster, Boston metro 2022

Source: U.S. Census ABS Company Summary 2022, aggregated from 2-digit NAICS sectors. Cluster crosswalk on the methodology page.

Suffolk County vs. the broader market

Owner-group availability, share of employer firms, 2022

Source: U.S. Census ABS Company Summary 2022 (CBSA 14460 and FIPS 25025).

Boston metro vs. Massachusetts

Owner-group availability, share of employer firms, 2022

Source: U.S. Census ABS Company Summary 2022 (CBSA 14460 and Massachusetts statewide).

Reading availability correctly

Availability sets the bar utilization is measured against. Getting the denominator right is the single most contested element of any disparity study.

Method notes
  • ABS availability here is a group's share of all employer firms (Total base), the conservative convention. The classifiable-only base yields modestly higher shares.
  • ABS owner groups overlap. A firm can be both women- and minority-owned, so group shares do not sum to 100%.
  • Public availability counts every firm equally. The full study re-runs the 2020 study's custom-census approach: weighting for firm capacity, geography, and verified willingness to bid, with the survey instrument published in advance.
Compare against utilization

The five-county RGMA

The 2020 study defined the relevant geographic market area as Norfolk, Suffolk, Plymouth, Middlesex, and Essex counties. The update should retest that definition against where bidders and awardees actually come from before adopting it.

Explore the RGMA map

The fuller universe: nonemployer firms

Owner-group share of firms, employer-only vs. all firms including nonemployers (sole proprietors), RGMA 2022

Source: U.S. Census ABS Nonemployer Statistics by Demographics (NES-D) 2022 and Company Summary 2022 (CBSA 14460).

Employer-only data understates diverse availability
About 82% of firms in the market are nonemployers (sole proprietors), and they are even more concentrated among diverse owners. Counting all firms, minority-owned availability rises from 15.4% to 25.3% and women-owned from 20.2% to 36.4%. Measured against the fuller base, the gap between availability and utilization is larger, not smaller.

The capacity gap

Average receipts per employer firm by owner group, RGMA 2022

Source: U.S. Census ABS Company Summary 2022 (CBSA 14460). Receipts per employer firm.

Why size is a barrier, not a merit signal

Minority- and women-owned firms are systematically smaller, which is what bonding, insurance, and experience requirements screen on.

The capacity doctrine
Minority-owned firms average about $1.82M in receipts per firm against $4.28M for non-minority firms, and 10 employees against 14.1. Disparity studies treat firm size and prior experience as outcomes of discrimination, not neutral merit, which is why availability is not adjusted for them.
How this becomes a barrier