The US counties furthest below the national rate
Census counts 1,943 county-and-category pairings where a US county has fewer of a home-service business, per resident, than the country does. The 60 largest shortfalls are below, ranked inside three population bands — a shortfall of thirty businesses in a county of fifty thousand and four thousand in Los Angeles are not the same kind of fact, and one national list would simply put every big county on top. The figure on the right is how many more of that business the county would hold at the national rate. Nobody is ranked here. These are counties.
How this is ranked: by the number of businesses, not the percentage. Percent is scale-free: one business short of three is the same “-67%” as a thousand short of three thousand, but the first is a rounding decision in a small county and the second is a market. Counting businesses fixes that — and then the bands fix what counting businesses breaks, because on one national list the biggest counties win every time regardless of how short they actually are.
Where the figure comes from: the county's own rate per 10,000 residents subtracted from the national rate, multiplied by the county population. Both rates are printed on the page each row links to, so the arithmetic is checkable from published numbers. Counts are businesses with employees plus sole proprietors, 2023 vintage.
Counties and equivalents: a few states don't use counties. Louisiana has parishes, Alaska has boroughs and census areas, Connecticut replaced its counties with planning regions in 2022, and Virginia has independent cities. Those are Census's own units, and this page lists whichever one Census reports for a place.
Counties under 100,000
Showing 20 of 981 below the national rate at this size.
- 1Benton County, ORjanitorial and cleaning services · 11.2 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents212below the US rate
- 2Steuben County, NYjanitorial and cleaning services · 13.5 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents177below the US rate
- 3Polk County, ORjanitorial and cleaning services · 14.4 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents165below the US rate
- 4Northeastern Connecticut Planning Regionjanitorial and cleaning services · 15.8 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents163below the US rate
- 5McKinley County, NMjanitorial and cleaning services · 10.3 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents155below the US rate
- 6Ozaukee County, WIjanitorial and cleaning services · 16.5 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents151below the US rate
- 7Chemung County, NYjanitorial and cleaning services · 14.1 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents150below the US rate
- 8Manitowoc County, WIjanitorial and cleaning services · 14.6 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents147below the US rate
- 9Dodge County, WIjanitorial and cleaning services · 16.4 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents144below the US rate
- 10Indiana County, PAjanitorial and cleaning services · 15.3 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents144below the US rate
- 11Cabell County, WVjanitorial and cleaning services · 17.2 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents143below the US rate
- 12Wood County, WIjanitorial and cleaning services · 13.4 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents143below the US rate
- 13Leavenworth County, KSjanitorial and cleaning services · 16.2 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents137below the US rate
- 14Northumberland County, PAjanitorial and cleaning services · 17.6 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents135below the US rate
- 15Sutter County, CAjanitorial and cleaning services · 19.0 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents134below the US rate
- 16Jefferson County, WIjanitorial and cleaning services · 17.1 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents134below the US rate
- 17Franklin County, WAjanitorial and cleaning services · 19.3 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents133below the US rate
- 18Apache County, AZjanitorial and cleaning services · 12.4 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents132below the US rate
- 19Tooele County, UTjanitorial and cleaning services · 17.2 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents127below the US rate
- 20Cattaraugus County, NYjanitorial and cleaning services · 15.9 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents127below the US rate
Counties of 100,000 to 500,000
Showing 20 of 699 below the national rate at this size.
- 1Waukesha County, WIjanitorial and cleaning services · 14.7 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents743below the US rate
- 2Onondaga County, NYjanitorial and cleaning services · 16.8 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents742below the US rate
- 3Hampden County, MAjanitorial and cleaning services · 17.8 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents685below the US rate
- 4Douglas County, COjanitorial and cleaning services · 15.0 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents679below the US rate
- 5Burlington County, NJjanitorial and cleaning services · 19.3 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents628below the US rate
- 6Richmond County, NYjanitorial and cleaning services · 20.5 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents600below the US rate
- 7Richmond County, NYlandscaping and lawn-care services · 6.1 vs 18.2 per 10,000 residents600below the US rate
- 8Gloucester County, NJjanitorial and cleaning services · 13.4 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents594below the US rate
- 9Pinal County, AZjanitorial and cleaning services · 21.0 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents567below the US rate
- 10Albany County, NYjanitorial and cleaning services · 15.5 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents546below the US rate
- 11Placer County, CAjanitorial and cleaning services · 19.8 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents545below the US rate
- 12Tulare County, CAjanitorial and cleaning services · 21.4 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents543below the US rate
- 13St. Charles County, MOjanitorial and cleaning services · 19.8 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents539below the US rate
- 14Dakota County, MNjanitorial and cleaning services · 21.1 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents517below the US rate
- 15Yakima County, WAjanitorial and cleaning services · 12.8 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents510below the US rate
- 16Clackamas County, ORjanitorial and cleaning services · 20.9 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents500below the US rate
- 17Davis County, UTjanitorial and cleaning services · 19.5 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents493below the US rate
- 18Howard County, MDjanitorial and cleaning services · 18.1 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents491below the US rate
- 19Orange County, NYjanitorial and cleaning services · 20.7 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents488below the US rate
- 20Naugatuck Valley Planning Region, CTjanitorial and cleaning services · 22.0 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents486below the US rate
Counties over 500,000
Showing 20 of 263 below the national rate at this size.
Read this band carefully. A dense urban county can sit far below the national rate for a trade that needs land — a borough with almost no private gardens will show a large lawn-care shortfall that no landscaper could fill. The shortfall is arithmetically real and is not an opening.
- 1Los Angeles County, CAlandscaping and lawn-care services · 13.9 vs 18.2 per 10,000 residents4,244below the US rate
- 2Kings County, NYlandscaping and lawn-care services · 2.1 vs 18.2 per 10,000 residents4,188below the US rate
- 3Cook County, ILlandscaping and lawn-care services · 10.4 vs 18.2 per 10,000 residents4,029below the US rate
- 4Queens County, NYlandscaping and lawn-care services · 3.0 vs 18.2 per 10,000 residents3,501below the US rate
- 5New York County, NYlandscaping and lawn-care services · 1.5 vs 18.2 per 10,000 residents2,736below the US rate
- 6King County, WAjanitorial and cleaning services · 21.0 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents2,671below the US rate
- 7Santa Clara County, CAjanitorial and cleaning services · 19.6 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents2,470below the US rate
- 8Bronx County, NYlandscaping and lawn-care services · 1.7 vs 18.2 per 10,000 residents2,270below the US rate
- 9New York County, NYjanitorial and cleaning services · 19.4 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents2,166below the US rate
- 10Maricopa County, AZjanitorial and cleaning services · 28.0 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents2,157below the US rate
- 11Philadelphia County, PAlandscaping and lawn-care services · 4.6 vs 18.2 per 10,000 residents2,134below the US rate
- 12Orange County, CAlandscaping and lawn-care services · 12.1 vs 18.2 per 10,000 residents1,925below the US rate
- 13King County, WAlandscaping and lawn-care services · 10.2 vs 18.2 per 10,000 residents1,839below the US rate
- 14Maricopa County, AZlandscaping and lawn-care services · 14.5 vs 18.2 per 10,000 residents1,736below the US rate
- 15Clark County, NVlandscaping and lawn-care services · 11.0 vs 18.2 per 10,000 residents1,709below the US rate
- 16Kings County, NYjanitorial and cleaning services · 26.3 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents1,649below the US rate
- 17Erie County, NYjanitorial and cleaning services · 15.5 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents1,626below the US rate
- 18Hennepin County, MNjanitorial and cleaning services · 20.1 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents1,585below the US rate
- 19Allegheny County, PAjanitorial and cleaning services · 20.7 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents1,473below the US rate
- 20Alameda County, CAjanitorial and cleaning services · 24.1 vs 32.7 per 10,000 residents1,407below the US rate
What this doesn't tell you: it measures how many businesses exist, not how many customers want one. A county below the national rate might be an opening, or it might be a place where fewer people buy that service — a rural county with long drives between houses will support fewer cleaners per resident no matter who starts one. Every row here is a lead to check locally, never a verdict.
Sources: US Census County Business Patterns ↗ (businesses with employees) and Nonemployer Statistics ↗ (sole proprietors). Every figure here is the two added together.
Census vintage 2023.
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