Preliminary analysis prepared independently by House Strategies Group LLC from public data. Not affiliated with or endorsed by Fairfax County. Figures illustrate analytical approach and are subject to revision with primary data. Not a procurement-disparity finding.

Module 1 · Market availability

Who is in the market

Availability is the denominator of every disparity index: the share of ready, willing, and able firms owned by each demographic group. These counts come from the U.S. Census Annual Business Survey, the most authoritative public source for firm ownership, for the Washington-Arlington-Alexandria market.

RGMA employer firms
113,780
ABS 2022, CBSA 47900
Minority-owned
37.2%
42,294 firms
Women-owned
25.4%
28,958 firms
Veteran-owned
5.6%
6,341 firms

Availability by owner group

Share of all employer firms in the RGMA, 2022

Source: U.S. Census Annual Business Survey, Company Summary 2022 (CBSA 47900). Retrieved 2026-06-16.

Availability trend, 2017 to 2022

Owner-group share of RGMA employer firms

Source: U.S. Census ABS Company Summary 2017 and 2022 (CBSA 47900).

Availability by industry cluster

Minority-, women-, Black-, and Asian-owned share of firms within each procurement-relevant cluster, RGMA 2022

Source: U.S. Census ABS Company Summary 2022, aggregated from 2-digit NAICS sectors. Cluster crosswalk on the methodology page.

Fairfax County vs. the broader market

Owner-group availability, share of employer firms, 2022

Source: U.S. Census ABS Company Summary 2022 (CBSA 47900 and FIPS 51059).

Reading availability correctly

Availability sets the bar utilization is measured against. Getting the denominator right is the single most contested element of any disparity study.

Method notes
  • Availability here is a group's share of all employer firms (ABS Total base), the conservative convention. The classifiable-only base yields modestly higher shares.
  • ABS owner groups overlap. A firm can be both women- and minority-owned, so group shares do not sum to 100%.
  • Public availability counts every firm equally. A full study weights for firm capacity, geography, and willingness to bid through a custom availability survey.
Compare against utilization

The fuller universe: nonemployer firms

Owner-group share of firms, employer-only vs. all firms including nonemployers (sole proprietors), RGMA 2022

Source: U.S. Census ABS Nonemployer Statistics by Demographics (NES-D) 2022 and Company Summary 2022 (CBSA 47900).

Employer-only data understates diverse availability
About 85% of firms in the market are nonemployers (sole proprietors), and they are even more concentrated among diverse owners. Counting all firms, minority-owned availability rises from 37.2% to 55% and women-owned from 25.5% to 41.4%. Measured against the fuller base, the gap between availability and utilization is larger, not smaller.

The capacity gap

Average receipts per employer firm by owner group, RGMA 2022

Source: U.S. Census ABS Company Summary 2022 (CBSA 47900). Receipts per employer firm.

Why size is a barrier, not a merit signal

Minority- and women-owned firms are systematically smaller, which is what bonding, insurance, and experience requirements screen on.

The capacity doctrine
Minority-owned firms average about $1.73M in receipts per firm against $4.08M for non-minority firms, and 9.7 employees against 16. Disparity studies treat firm size and prior experience as outcomes of discrimination, not neutral merit, which is why availability is not adjusted for them.
How this becomes a barrier