Shopify has published its first entrepreneurship index, mapping the economic impact of its users across the world.
Compared to smaller economies like Lithuania and Romania, which are in second and third place respectively, Canada lags behind. Canada was listed in 12th place in the Shopify entrepreneurship index, on a roster of 40 countries.
Founded in Ottawa, Shopify powers more than a million businesses through its suite of retail solutions. Now it wants to measure the impact of entrepreneurs within the Shopify ecosystem with a comprehensive dataset that tracks their growth and contributions.
The United States led the index, with an increase of 11 percent in total jobs supported as compared to 2021.
The index was made in partnership with Deloitte, which calculated the number of jobs supported, value of exports generated, and economic impact of Shopify businesses in terms of GDP and business activity.
Shopify estimates that its merchants in Canada supported over 150,000 jobs in 2022 and generated $25.5 billion in business activity, with both metrics going up by six percent since 2021.
This reflects the growing rate of full-time employment in the country. Despite layoffs sweeping the technology and financial sectors, the Canadian economy has continued to add jobs in other industries like sciences and trade.
Of the 150,000 jobs supported in Canada, Shopify reported that 61,025 are directly employed by their merchants or self-employed as business owners who use Shopify.
The United States led the index. The country saw an increase of 11 percent in total jobs supported as compared to 2021. In second place is Lithuania, which also saw its number of jobs supported climb by six percent like Canada.
The estimate of the number of jobs supported takes into account the entire network of employment that is supported by the economic activity created by Shopify merchants. This includes merchants’ jobs, their suppliers, and other work that is sustained by the spending of increased household income.
Shopify then compares the economic impact of the jobs, as well as other listed metrics such as business activity and GDP impact, with the national values of each country. It looks at the performance of each statistic both on a per capita basis and overall.
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According to Shopify, its merchants supported 5.2 million jobs globally in 2022, an increase of 8.3 percent from 2021. Shopify businesses also contributed $490.5 billion USD in total economic activity.
Canadian Shopify business owners generated $2.6 billion USD in exports last year, and made $11.8 billion CAD in terms of GDP impact, the report claims.
Shopify said the entrepreneurship index will be updated each quarter with new data and analysis.
Feature image courtesy Burst.