
Countries ranked by ease of starting a business - chaosmachine
http://www.doingbusiness.org/economyrankings/
======
reitzensteinm
Starting a company in New Zealand was pleasantly surprising. First you sign up
for an account at <http://companies.govt.nz>, then you use the web app (which
worked fine with Opera) to fill in the details about your new company. Consent
forms are emailed to you, which you fill out, scan in and upload. A few hours
later, after being reviewed by a human, your company is formed and your
certificate of incoproration is emailed to you.

In fact the only trouble I had at all was that PayPal wouldn't let me sign up
with a business that had been started that day - I had to wait until the day
after to start taking payments.

One of the few government interactions I've ever had that left me in a better
mood afterwards.

~~~
known
Wondering why remaining nations fail to emulate NZ.

~~~
borism
They're not so remote from everywhere so they don't need to?

------
lionhearted
Not sure how accurate this list is. Thailand, for instance, requires all
businesses to have at least 51% Thai ownership, and I've heard Thai courts are
fairly heavily biased towards locals over foreigners. Foreigners can skirt
around this a little bit by having 10+ Thai silent partners in different parts
of the country that don't know each other who collect a dividend or payment
each year without active involvement, but still a hassle and reflective of the
lack of trust Thailand has for foreign investors and entrepreneurs.

Also, I was surprised by some of the rankings. I'd have expected UAE and
Israel to be higher than Germany and the Scandinavian countries for instance,
but maybe I'm biased by experiences with small sample size. I've had German
friends complain to no end about the Kafka-esque bureaucracy of the country,
and generally I've had Israelis and expats in the Emirates tell me doing
business is easy in those places.

~~~
mjnaus
You're wrong here. For certain businesses, foreign ownership can be the full
100%. When we opened our business here, we actually had the change to go this
route, but choose not to because it would have been more hassle though.

But I am also wondering how accurate this list is. And what qualifies as a
"business"? Here in Thailand, many small businesses don't requite any form of
legal entity and opening a small shop for example would be as easy as renting
some space, putting in inventory and open your doors.... doens't get much
easier then that. Imagine trying that in the US or UK... The ease of opening a
small business here in Thailand beats any country that comes before Thailand
on that list...

~~~
lionhearted
> You're wrong here. For certain businesses, foreign ownership can be the full
> 100%. When we opened our business here, we actually had the change to go
> this route, but choose not to because it would have been more hassle though.

Could you elaborate on how it went with your business? I'd like to learn more
because I like some parts of Thailand, but I always heard differently. Here's
the top google result, for instance:

"A foreigner can form or buy a Thai company, and even be the sole director of
it, but Thai citizens must jointly own at least 51% of its shares – meaning a
majority is technically under Thai control. Currently it is possible to
allocate shares to several unrelated people, who could have no combined effect
on the company's business, and this can be arranged by the lawyer, but along
with most things connected with business in Thailand, there are considerable
risks involved."

<http://www.retire-asia.com/thaibiz.shtml>

Actually, the whole article is generally very cautionary and negative against
a foreigner owning a business in Thailand, which jives with what I've heard
people who spend time there say.

Maybe it's only businesses with real estate ownership or leases that come
under these terms? EX, no real estate, then don't worry about it? I think
regardless, you'd be fine working from your laptop.

Anyways, I'm curious if you want to elaborate more. International business law
is one of those things that every little bit you know becomes more helpful in
understanding the broad picture of how markets work, imports/exports work,
etc. It's something I try to pay attention to, research, and ask questions
about when I'm visiting a place.

~~~
mjnaus
The way described in the article is indeed the way it has been until a few
years back, but recent governments have made some attempts to become more open
for foreign entrepreneurs; granted, it's still hard sometimes but I do have
the feeling it's getting better.

As far as our own company goes: we registered our first company a few years
(2?) back and when we went into the process, we were also still under the
impression that the foreign shareholders can only hold up to 49% of the
shares. However, we quickly found out it was indeed possible for foreigners to
fully own the company (according to the government official the regulations
changed about a year before that). But we also quickly learned that this route
would mean tons more paperwork and it would become more costly. We also needed
to present our paperwork to the BOI, pay extra fees and hope they would accept
the paperwork. And according to the government official, we would expose our
company to tighter control from the government (which would probably mean more
"tea money" as well). So, in the end we decided against full foreign
ownership, although it was an option we considered.

I realize many people are negative against owning a business here Thailand,
perhaps due to bad experiences. I can only speak for myself (and a few
relations who enjoy doing business here as well). Maybe I should mention I
don't actually do business here, we pretty much only work with customers
abroad. I love living and working here and wouldn't want it any other way for
the time being!

~~~
lionhearted
Thanks for the feedback, very good info. If you happen to stop by Saigon
before the end of the month, shoot me an email if you'd like to grab a coffee.
I'm in Kuala Lumpur in November too, feel free to reach out. Godspeed and much
prosperity in your business.

------
dboyd
My experience in Canada in starting a business agrees with its 2nd place rank.
It only took a couple of hours to get an incorporated business setup, as long
as it's a numbered company (e.g., 4312341 Alberta Inc., although, I forget
what my number was). It's a couple more hours to open a bank account, make a
shareholder loan, and get company cheques (sic).

All in all, it takes about a morning to have a legal operating funded company
up and running.

Of course, revenue is another story :).

~~~
ursablanco
I agree, in Canada it seems trivial. Perhaps the study presumes some lower
level of capacity, literacy or computer ability.

The numbers for 'enforceability of contracts' and 'paying taxes' are absurd.
Puts the rest of the results in doubt.

------
barrydahlberg
My wife is Japanese and when I said I was starting a company she asked me
_But, how? Are you even allowed to do that?_ I didn't really understand how
you could not be at the time.

I guess that's why NZ ranks #1 and Japan ranks #91 for getting started.

~~~
patio11
One of the big things we did at the tech incubator is tell people how easy it
is to start a company -- there isn't a significantly higher paperwork burden
or capital requirement these days than there is for a US LLC. (That did not
used to be true.) The problem is that this has not hit the mainstream in terms
of cultural acceptance yet.

I knew this and I was absolutely amazed by the amount of time it took to get
my health insurance, pension, and taxes squared away when I went full-time: 3
hours. Two hours of that was bike riding to and from city hall.

~~~
basugasubaku
How does one get a visa to be in Japan if they intend to start a company
there? It would appear to be difficult to get a visa if you are not already
profitable, correct?

~~~
patio11
Talk to me privately for specifics. Short version: getting a visa is hard,
renewing one is easy if you are as profitable as your previous employment. The
easy paths go through native megacorps.

------
nbf
South Africa's ranking is likely to fall in the next survey. There have been
recently been well publicised cases where company directors have been
fraudulently replaced at CIPRO, the government agency that handles these
registrations, due to a lack of adequate controls. The directors are replaced
and the bank accounts are emptied (the new "directors" get signing powers at
the bank) before anyone realises what's happened.

The Deeds Office (land registry) has also has had fraudlent land transfers
going through, and although stealing land is more difficult that hijacking a
company, it has happened, with complicity between crooked lawyers and corrupt
officials.

In most cases these hijackings, of land, and of companies, have been reversed
by courts, but the time and expense of going to court could cripple a small
business.

If you start a business in South Africa, and decide to incorporate, you should
make sure you verify directors regularly, watch your business bank accounts
closely, and hope that the government sorts out the mess (there are new
controls that are being introduced already at CIPRO).

------
nihilocrat
I'm curious if anyone has worked for a company in Singapore, done lots of
business with one, or better yet started one. By these rankings and the
stereotypes I've learned it basically seems like a capitalist's paradise, with
practically the whole society being pro-business and a gigantic minority of
the population (42% according to Wikipedia) being foreign workers/students.

~~~
metamemetics
My impression was it used to be a haven for large business. But due to rising
costs they are moving nearby to Malaysia and Indonesia and just keeping
management offices in Singapore (ex. memc.com). I haven't heard of it
attracting young international people looking to do startups primarily because
it's not a very liberal society. Chewing gum is illegal and cannabis
possession carries a penalty of execution. A sharp contrast to Silicon
Valley\California.

~~~
kirvyteo
Why do you bother about chewing gum and having cannabis if you are looking for
a place to start or run a business? Doesn't factors like low corruption,
safety or market size matters more?

~~~
hga
"Disneyland with the death penalty" may be a unique selling proposition but I
well believe it when metamemetics says it's bad at "attracting young
international people looking to do startups".

There's a lot more than that, e.g. you have to be careful about what you write
and perhaps say about the government.

~~~
kirvyteo
That is being paranoid. I don't understand the downvoting. Is US a "Disneyland
with guns" then? How many people have been killed by guns versus death penalty
in Singapore? (Before you downvote me again, hear me out)

I live here. I see lots of curses in facebook and websites about the
government and I mean really really mean curses, personal attacks and so on. I
complain lots about the government. And to clarify, there is a line which you
don't cross, which is the religious line and accusing the govt of corruption
without proof. It is rather simple.

I don't really see how young people doing startups care about that? Just
respect your neighbours and their religion, is it hard to do? If you have
proof that someone is corrupted, just report it. (Btw, some govt guy just got
charged for a huge corruption case.) Having a death penalty doesn't mean the
whole country is one brainwashed crazed population looking to execute anyone.
In fact there are so many foreigners here at any startup event that the locals
are beginning to seem like the minority.

Yes, this small place(market) has lots of problems and it is definitely not
disneyland. But to say it is a bad place just because of death penalty or lack
of freedom to insult other religion is just ridiculous. Just look beyond
political nonsense and journalistic opinions.

------
auxbuss
Well, that put numbers around my recent decision to return from Spain to the
UK. I love Spain to bits, but doing business there, legally, is utterly
impossible even when fluent in the language. It's very easy to do business
there illegally and cheap, if that's your thing.

~~~
lemming
It's not impossible, but it is a gigantic pain in the ass. We contracted a law

~~~
lemming
I'm not sure why I can't seem to edit my previous comment, or what happened to
it.

We contracted a law firm specialising in foreigners running companies here in
Spain. They're really good, but the amount of running around I have to do is
still huge and some things really are impossible (e.g. getting a foreign
contract talking about monetary amounts notarised). I would certainly never
incorporate here by choice.

------
points
This is very inaccurate.

For example, starting a business in the UK takes an hour or so (Fill out a
form online). But it's listed here as taking 13 days, and thus UK is ranked
16th for starting a business.

------
quizbiz
I'm surprised Israel was so low given the info I read in the book Startup
Nation (<http://www.startupnationbook.com/>)

~~~
ronnier
Israel ranks really low on "Dealing with Construction Permits" and
"Registering Property", according to this list. Don't let this list fool you,
it's a true start up nation. The amount of tech and start-ups coming from
Israel is amazing.

From the book: "a country of 7.1 million, only 60 years old, surrounded by
enemies, in a constant state of war since its founding, with no natural
resources— produces more start-up companies than large, peaceful, and stable
nations like Japan, China, India, Korea, Canada, and the UK? How is it that
Israel has, per person, attracted over twice as much venture capital
investment as the US and thirty times more than Europe?"

~~~
dejb
I suspect that not having the correct ethnicity or religious beliefs would be
an obstacle for some though.

------
acangiano
Ranking for the G8 nations:

4 - United States

5 - United Kingdom

8 - Canada

15 - Japan

25 - Germany

31 - France

78 - Italy

120 - Russia

With the exception of Russia, which has its roots in communism, Italy is by
far the worst G8 country you could start a business in.

~~~
apotheon
Italy and Germany have their (recent) roots in fascism. France has its in . .
. well. I'm not going to go there.

Note that the UK produced Adam Smith and, to a nontrivial degree, the US, and
Canada. The culture and early government of the US in particular was notably
influenced by the ideas of Adam Smith as well. What Smith called "economic
individualism" is pretty much _the_ foundation of a strong economy, and to the
extent that we stray from that two things happen:

1\. individuals find it more difficult to start and run small businesses

2\. the economy suffers

I am not surprised at all at the relative rankings of these G8 nations.

~~~
loewenskind
The common connection between companies that don't do so well is corruption,
not previous government choices.

As far as following Adam Smith's works, the economy the US has is a caricature
of Smith's ideas (e.g. Smith was anti-monopoly).

~~~
apotheon
1\. Do you think that the form of a government does not affect its tendency
toward corruption?

2\. Note that I was talking about Smith's influence on _early_ US government.
The nation has obviously strayed from that quite a lot since then -- and has
economically gone downhill quite a lot, as well.

~~~
loewenskind
1\. Yes and no. The smaller you make the government's _power_ the less their
corruption will matter. On the other hand, if the government handles more
things (e.g. Sweden) then I would expect corruption to be attacked more
because it harms more people.

The US is kind of a special case I think. They have an absolutely enormous
government that few people trust and even fewer think anything can be done to
change it. Sweden, for contract, is voted the most Democratic country. Given
the size of their government, this seems to imply that they are much more
positive about it.

------
paolomaffei
Yes, Italy did it! Last in Western Europe and highly developed countries (a
part from Greece).

~~~
RK
I don't understand how Greece is rated 76 in "paying taxes". My understanding
is that Greeks simply don't pay taxes... </sarcasm>

------
apotheon
Starting a business in the United States is a little like pulling your own
teeth while getting your fingernails trimmed with a wood chipper. The fact
that it still ranks fourth overall just indicates how much _worse_ most of the
rest of the world is.

It's amazing to me that so many nations (the US included) seem to want it to
be so difficult for people to succeed in business.

~~~
jsolson
I set up a Georgia LLC in the course of an afternoon. State registration,
federal EIN, bank account. Income for the LLC is treated as personal income
for me (it's a single member LLC that's disregarded by the IRS), so even taxes
aren't that complicated.

Perhaps I'm doing something very wrong or very illegal, but nothing I've read
seems to suggest that.

What did you find to be so much more painful?

~~~
apotheon
In my area, it takes no fewer than three different licenses just to set up a
consultancy that doesn't even sell products (pure service oriented business)
-- and that doesn't address any of the issues aside from licensure (tax ID,
ensuring your business name is not a trademark infringement, et cetera). The
worst thing about it, though, is not the complexity of it. The worst thing
about it is that, because one has to check everything at local, state, and
federal levels, and because each of these levels is often very poorly
organized where the "end user" is concerned, it took me an afternoon just to
find out about all that stuff. In fact, some of it I stumbled across by
accident while looking for something else, and was surprised to find it. I'm
pretty much _positive_ that I missed some things before I gave up.

It _requires_ a lawyer to be even reasonably sure (as opposed to _completely_
sure) you aren't doing something illegal. If I have to choose between paying
for a lawyer I can ill afford and wondering for the first three years of
starting the business whether I'm going to end up in court for doing it wrong,
the process of setting up a business is _not_ easy enough.

edit: There is a difference between "setting up" a business on paper (so you
can claim to have one) and being able to start actually conducting business
without running the risk of pissing off government.

~~~
jsolson
I agree that there is a difference. On the other hand, once you have the
business legally established (the easy part), you _can_ conduct business as
that entity. You might piss off the government and the liable for
fees/penalties, but you're not going to invalidate the actions of the business
by doing that.

Perhaps I'm just being naïve, but I figure if the rules are difficult for me
to find it's also fairly unlikely that I'll get caught for not following them.
Or, I suppose, I feel like by the time it becomes a serious risk I'll have
grown to the point where lawyers become a necessity anyway.

~~~
apotheon
One can conduct business in violation of the law _anywhere_. When it's done
intelligently, we call the result "black marketeering". When it's done
stupidly, we call the result "jail time".

------
sandGorgon
Just wanted to mention the process of registering a company in India has
mostly moved online using the Ministry of Company Affairs website
(<http://www.mca.gov.in/>). The most time consuming thing is acquiring a
Digital Certificate (which is how most financial filings are done in India
these days), which involves in-person verification.

India recently introduced Limited Liability Partnerships
(<http://www.llp.gov.in/>) which is a much, much simpler way of registering a
company, especially in the software field, than anything else (most of it
online)

~~~
manish
I was really sad to see India ranked so low. I remember my friend starting a
company by paying Rs 6000 to broker, who took care of all the things. Things
work differently in India, if you do not go through a broker, you might take a
few weeks :-(

------
kloncks
Interesting that the countries with the most startups (USA, Israel, some in
Europe, etc) aren't that highly ranked compared to surprises like Saudi
Arabia. I really didn't expect Israel to be so low and Saudi Arabia so high.

Anyone know why?

~~~
zalew
Does it not only concern natives? Doing business as a native in countries of
the Gulf is far more different than doing it as a foreigner (see how to set up
a business in Dubai, UAE).

UAE is also high in the ranks, still for me, as I researched, starting up
there seemed more complicated and expensive than here in Poland (low in the
ranks), except taxes (a PITA around here).

------
jlees
Really surprised that the UK ranks 16th on 'Starting a Business' and the US
ranks 8th. From what I know, it takes a lot longer, costs more, and tends to
involve actual lawyers to open a business in the US. In the UK, I did it all
online for £25.

~~~
InclinedPlane
Where do you "know" this from? Starting a business is dead simple in the US.
Create a Delaware class-C corporation, or one in the state you live in if you
prefer (in my case, in the state of Washington, it was just a few online forms
and a nominal fee).

~~~
jlees
Belated reply, my knowledge for the US side is from threads on HN, which have
greatly exaggerated the process if it's true that you can do it all online in
a few minutes.

------
frederikfleck
Shocking results for Germany. Know where that is coming from... But once you
have done a bit there it is quiet straight forward. So let me know if I can
help anybody doing business or starting a company in Germany.

------
jemmj
I don't trust this list at all. I have just formed a company in Ireland and
Portugal. Ireland is ranked 7 and Portugal ranked 48. In reality Portugal was
about 3 times faster than Ireland, but cost about double.

~~~
hga
Cost is part of the methodology and they factor in per capita income, both of
which adversely affect Portugal:
[http://www.doingbusiness.org/MethodologySurveys/StartingBusi...](http://www.doingbusiness.org/MethodologySurveys/StartingBusiness.aspx)

------
biznickman
Maybe rather than push the startup visa act we should push the: create a
company in 5 minutes act and the pay less taxes on your company act :)

------
derre1
I'm not sure all those numbers are correct. I was born in the Dominican
Republic and I can say that the time to open a business is least than 20 days.

Besides, there are some companies offering "packaged business"s with legal
fees, registrations, and other paperwork ready. You can buy one of those and
get up and running in 24 hours. They take care of transfering the company to
you.

~~~
hga
What's the cost, especially compared to standard incomes in the nation? I know
a number of countries score very poorly because of this (CHANGED: per capita
income is a factor in the calculation:
[http://www.doingbusiness.org/MethodologySurveys/StartingBusi...](http://www.doingbusiness.org/MethodologySurveys/StartingBusiness.aspx)).

------
mmaunder
The rankings seem almost arbitrary. South Africa is 2 for getting credit. I'm
South African and there's just now way that's true. Banking in SA is extremely
expensive and there's no such thing as a free checking account. Most of the
population has no credit history and those who do use credit sparingly and
find it hard to get.

US is 8 and UK 16 for starting a business. What does that mean? It's hard/easy
to incorporate? It's incredibly easy to create a Limited company in the UK or
LLC, S or C corp in the USA. (I've inc'd in both countries). What does the
number 1 country have that US or UK doesn't have?

Paying taxes in the USA is 61 vs South Africa's 23? No way. Paying your taxes
in South Africa is a serious pain in the behind - I continue to do it. We file
our USA C corp and personal corp taxes ourselves each year and it's a breeze
in the States.

My guess is this is based on public opinion with a relatively small sample
size per country.

~~~
nbf
>Most of the population has no credit history and those who do use credit
sparingly and find it hard to get

I don't agree with you here. The entire furniture retail industry is based on
selling goods on credit to poor people. The National Credit Act tightened
lending up, and reduced some of the more blatant exploitation, but it is very
easy to get credit, if you want it.

>Paying taxes in the USA is 61 vs South Africa's 23? No way. Paying your taxes
in South Africa is a serious pain in the behind - I continue to do it. We file
our USA C corp and personal corp taxes ourselves each year and it's a breeze
in the States.

I am surprised that you consider tax in South Africa to be more complex than
the US. Could you elaborate?

------
MarkMc
Interesting that 8 out of the top 10 countries are former British colonies (or
Britain itself).

------
frisco
Reading this list made me think, "wow, I could have been born in so many other
countries, with such dramatically different possibilities, but I was born in
the US." Just a strange thought to consider. A lot of these countries barely
have the rule of law: police misbehavior anywhere is unacceptable, but next
time I see "Police mistreat innocent bystander X" here or on reddit, I'll
think "but at least you can't walk down the street and bribe the cop to get
away with Z" for a second before I start being furious with the system.

------
smcl
Interesting to see Chile so far down the list (well, 49th) given how keen they
have been to attract startups recently.

------
agconway
Note: there is literally no relationship between a country's 'Starting a
Business' rank and their 'Closing a Business.'

<http://plixi.com/p/50051085>

This seems odd to me, but wonder if anyone has an explanation as to why this
might be?

------
utunga
mmm NZ seems very high in the rankings but the vc/angel investment community
very immature over here... possible opportunity for low hanging fruit just
across the ditch for a few valley based investors perhaps ? ;-)

~~~
steveh73
NZ has expensive (and not particularly fast) internet, which is probably why.
On the other hand, setting up a limited-liability company took me an hour
(including registering for GST) and cost $40 when I did it (it's a little more
now), and costs nothing to renew. And the time zone difference means we're
often working when the US is sleeping, which can be handy when you're
deploying a new version of a production site for a US audience.

~~~
vosper
Deploying updates to production sites when the US is sleeping is a massive
boon, it was one of the reasons my previous employer did all their R&D in New
Zealand. The downside is that pagers tended to go off in the middle of our
night when server load was highest.

The company has been extremely successful, but the software is complex and
recruiting and retaining skilled employees here has become an issue for them.
I think they've been forced to move some R&D over to the US as a result.

------
maheshs
I am not complaining, but not sure how they are calculating it. Ease of
starting a business also depend upon the business type in every country.

------
rglovejoy
What is the spread? For instance, the US comes in fourth and the UK fifth. How
much of a difference is there between being #4 and #5?

------
rikthevik
I think there's probably a direct correlation to economic strength and
development here as well.

------
nradov
This is a ranking of ease of _doing_ business, not _starting_ a business. If
you want to start a business in the USA as a sole proprietorship then you can
just go ahead and start it.

~~~
chaosmachine
Look at the second column, "Starting a Business".

[http://www.doingbusiness.org/economyrankings/?direction=Asc&...](http://www.doingbusiness.org/economyrankings/?direction=Asc&sort=2)

------
borism
anyone planning/doing a start-up in Mauritius?

