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Decatur, AL

Decatur business statistics
Employer establishments with 1-49 employees
(2007)
3,104 3,516
Small business growth rate
(2004-2007)
5% 4.1%
State business tax climate ranking
(out of 50 states)
21 N/A
Percentage of population with bachelor's degree
(ages 25-34)
17.3% 23.5%
Violent crime
(rate per 100,000 inhabitants, 2007)
234.3 385.1
Property crime
(rate per 100,000 inhabitants, 2007)
3,503.6 3,395.2
Population growth
(2003-2008)
2% 4.93%
Per-capita income
(2007)
$32,295 $31,933
Per-capita income growth
(2002-2007)
26% 23.6%
GDP (in millions)
(2006)
$4,826 $4,952
GDP growth
(2001-2006)
34% 33%
Average hourly wage
(2008)
16.44 $17.50
Housing foreclosure rate
(first half of 2009)
402 850
Median rent
(2009, for a 2-bedroom housing unit)
$600 $737
Housing price-to-income (HPI) ratio
(first quarter of 2009)
2.0% 1.8%
Long-term HPI ratio
(20-year average, 1984-2004)
1.59% 1.67%
HPI deviation from long-term average
-6% 0.1%

All statistics are for the full Metropolitan Statistical Area. For a complete list of data sources, see "How we picked the Best Places."

From the November 2009 issue
Best Places Winners
MAPS

BORROW

Local smallbiz lenders

  • Redstone Federal Credit Union
  • Compass Bancshares
  • Superior Financial Group
  • Innovative Bank
  • American Heritage Holdings
See all local lenders

What do you think of Decatur?
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ireportTell us why: Low taxes? Talented workers? An active small business community? Send us your photos and videos, and you could be featured in our upcoming coverage of reader-picked Best Places to Launch. More
This year we partnered with the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation to find the 50 most business-friendly communities in America.

With help from Robert Fairlie, an economist and leading scholar of entrepreneurship at the University of California, Santa Cruz, we developed a methodology and sifted through such data on factors such as per capita income, hourly wages, workforce quality, crime rates, taxes and foreclosures. More

Comments? E-mail the editors
Data partners

This package was produced in partnership with the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation.

Foreclosure data provided by RealtyTrac.

Housing price-to-income data provided by Moody's Economy.com.