October 31, 2025 – New Orleans outpaces the nation in entrepreneurship by a healthy margin according to new data from “The New Orleans Index at Twenty: Measuring Greater New Orleans’ Progress Toward Resilience” published by The Data Center on Aug. 5. The report highlights the region as an enduring engine of innovation.
In the past year, 592 out of every 100,000 adults launched a business, a rate 34% above the national average and 29% higher than the average across the 49 other largest U.S. metropolitan areas including cities like New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Dallas. The findings come from The Data Center, a New Orleans–based research organization that tracks the region’s economic and demographic trends.