Providence ranks middling in list of best cities for business women

THE PROVIDENCE METRO area, which includes parts of southern Massachusetts, ranks No. 52 in a Bizwomen list of the top 100 cities nationwide for women in business. / PBN FILE PHOTO
THE PROVIDENCE METRO area, which includes parts of southern Massachusetts, ranks No. 52 in a Bizwomen list of the top 100 cities nationwide for women in business. / PBN FILE PHOTO

PROVIDENCE – Rhode Island’s capital city ranks No. 52 in a list of the 100 best cities for women in business, compiled by the Bizwomen business journal and released Thursday.

Bizwomen rated the 100 largest metropolitan areas in the country for the study, looking at opportunities available for women “both as entrepreneurs and climbers of the corporate ladder.” The cities with the most well-educated and highly paid women landed at the top of the list, Bizwomen said.

In addition to the overall rankings, Bizwomen also measured how each market performed in education, pay level, managerial experience and entrepreneurial spirit among women, using a five-star scale in which five stars indicated a market was among the top 10 percent of all metros in a given category, four stars were awarded to markets in the next 15 percent, and so on.

The Providence metro area, which extends into southeastern Massachusetts, earned three stars in the education and management categories. Twenty-eight percent of women in Providence hold bachelor’s degrees, Bizwomen said, and 11 percent hold advanced degrees.

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In terms of managerial experience, 7.3 percent of women in Providence hold management positions with a median salary of $56,592, and women represent 40.4 percent of all managers in the region.

However, Providence performed less well in the pay level and entrepreneurial categories. A woman in Providence earns on average only $6,876 per $10,000 in earnings for men, earning the city two stars for that measure. In addition, the metro area claims only 232 women-owned firms per 10,000 residents, only 12.3 percent of which have paid employees. Providence received one star for women’s entrepreneurial spirit.

Washington, D.C., was the only market to earn five stars in all four categories, and also ranked at No. 1 on the overall ranking. Forty-six percent of all women in the nation’s capital have bachelor’s degrees, and 21 percent hold advanced degrees, Bizwomen found. In addition, the typical female worker earns $39,824 in Washington, D.C., and 11.8 percent of women in business hold management positions.

Other cities that ranked highly on the Bizwomen list were:

  • 2. San Francisco-Oakland
  • 3. San Jose, Calif.
  • 4. Baltimore
  • 5. Denver
  • 6. New York
  • 7. Boston
  • 8. Minneapolis-St. Paul
  • 9. Madison, Wis.
  • 10. Raleigh, N.C.

At No. 52, Providence landed just below Charleston, S.C. and just above Buffalo, N.Y.

Provo, Utah, where a typical woman earns $4,065 for every $10,000 earned by a typical man, ranked as the worst city for women in business among the top 100 metro areas. Ogden, Utah; Augusta, Ga.; Bakersfield, Calif.; and El Paso, Texas, rounded out the bottom five.

To view the complete ranking, visit www.bizjournals.com/bizwomen.

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