Alaska's private sector employment mirrors nation.

• Author: Miller, Amy
• Position: ALASKA TRENDS

Although everyone knows we do things a little differently in Alaska, when it comes to the makeup of the private sector, Alaska closely resembles its regional neighbors and the nation as a whole.

Alaska's private sector was composed of roughly 19,976 establishments in 2014, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and most were classified as "small"--with fewer than five employees (59 percent). Another 17 percent employed between five and nine people, bringing the total percentage of employers in Alaska with fewer than ten employees to 76 percent. Likewise, the share of employers with four or fewer employers in the United States is 62 percent and with fewer than ten is 77 percent. The same similarities hold up as firm sizes increase. Firms with more than five hundred employees account for just 0.14 percent in Alaska and 0.16 percent in the rest of the United States.

Although large employers make up a tiny percentage of overall businesses, a sizeable chunk--39.4 percent--of private-sector employees in Alaska work for a large firm (firms with more than one hundred employees are considered "large" and represent 1.44 percent of Alaska employers). By comparison, 42.4 percent of all Americans work for large employers, which make up 1.46 percent of total employers in the country.

Where Alaska differs from the rest of the United States is in the types of business that dominate local...