Private worksites with 1,000 or more employees

What this dataset measures

Built to check claims that Washington is losing its businesses or big employers. It brings together the direct measures of that claim: company filings for headquarters, federal counts of very large worksites and of all private businesses, Census counts of new business filings, and the state's layoff-notice database, with the 2025 change in the state's layoff-notice law marked.

Geography

Washington, United States

Unit of observation

Varies by table: company, year, quarter, or layoff notice

Update cadence

One-time release; may be revised as new quarterly data arrive

Curator

FactHub Research Team

Curated data tables

Private worksites with 1,000 or more employees

QCEW first-quarter count of private establishments in size class 9 (1,000 or more employees) and their March employment.

Unit of observation: Year (first quarter)

large-worksites.csv text/csv · 285 bytes

All 8 rows 5 columns Download the file

All 8 rows

year	waSites establishments	usSites establishments	waMarchJobs jobs	usMarchJobs jobs
2019	117	6329	386890	13912815
2020	120	6387	411199	14182866
2021	113	6165	398575	13776798
2022	119	6489	410992	14740319
2023	137	6661	481681	15241190
2024	146	6702	499520	15649393
2025	153	6823	514829	15939202
2026	154	6762	511149	15910172

5 field definitions

Field	Type	Meaning	Units	Value type
year	integer	Year.	—	observed
waSites	integer	Washington private worksites with 1,000+ employees.	establishments	observed
usSites	integer	U.S. private worksites with 1,000+ employees.	establishments	observed
waMarchJobs	integer	March employment at those Washington sites.	jobs	observed
usMarchJobs	integer	March employment at those U.S. sites.	jobs	observed

Supporting files

Source snapshots, manifests, quality reports, documentation, and other materials used to produce or review this release.

• farm-employer-names.txt Documentation · text/plain · 1 KB (1,040 bytes)

  The employer names flagged as farms or orchards in the layoff notices.

• build.js Transformation manifest · text/javascript · 11.7 KB (11,994 bytes)

  Node.js script that builds every table and saved analysis from the input files.

• official-series.json Source manifest · application/json · 5.6 KB (5,715 bytes)

  The official figures used as inputs (BLS QCEW, Census Business Formation Statistics, population, ESD workbook), with series IDs.

• sec-submissions.json Source manifest · application/json · 3.3 KB (3,400 bytes)

  The fields read from the SEC EDGAR submissions API for each company.

• analyses.json Documentation · application/json · 10.9 KB (11,209 bytes)

  Every saved-analysis result, as written by build.js.

Sources

1. U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, EDGAR submissions API Business address and latest annual report (Form 10-K) for each company, from https://data.sec.gov/submissions/CIK##########.json

   Retrieved November 3, 2026. Public domain (U.S. government work). Permitted

   Reliability: Government. Addresses are what each company reports to the SEC on its filings. The SEC has no stake in where companies locate.

2. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, QCEW establishment size data First-quarter counts of private worksites with 1,000 or more employees and their March employment, 2019-2026 (same file pattern for each year)

   Retrieved November 3, 2026. Public domain (U.S. government work). Permitted

   Reliability: Government. Built from unemployment-insurance tax reports that nearly all employers file each quarter. Washington's data come from the state Employment Security Department.

3. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, QCEW series ENU5300020510, ENUUS00020510, ENU5300010510, ENUUS00010510 Private-sector establishment counts and employment, Washington and U.S.

   Retrieved November 3, 2026. Public domain (U.S. government work). Permitted

   Reliability: Government. Same unemployment-insurance records as the size data. Establishment counts depend on how employers' reporting units are recorded.

4. Washington Employment Security Department, WARN layoff and closure database Every layoff and closure notice in the database, June 2018 to November 2, 2026

   Retrieved November 3, 2026. Public record (Washington state government). Permitted

   Reliability: Government. Notices are filed by employers under the federal WARN Act and, from July 27, 2025, Washington's own notice law. ESD lists them by the date it receives them. The first 15 rows of the copy matched the live table on November 3, 2026.

5. Washington State Legislature, RCW 49.45.010 Definitions of covered employer and mass layoff in Washington's notice law (2025 c 277)

   Retrieved November 3, 2026. Public record (Washington state government). Permitted

   Reliability: Government. Official statute text from the Code Reviser.

6. Washington Employment Security Department Date the state notice law took effect

   Retrieved November 3, 2026. Public record (Washington state government). Permitted

   Reliability: Government. The agency that administers the notice law and keeps the database.

7. 29 U.S. Code 2101 (Legal Information Institute, Cornell Law School) Federal WARN Act definitions of employer and mass layoff

   Retrieved November 3, 2026. Public domain statute text. Permitted

   Reliability: Academic. Cornell's copy of the U.S. Code text.

8. Census Bureau Business Formation Statistics via FRED, BAHBATOTALNSAWA Monthly high-propensity business applications, Washington, not seasonally adjusted

   Retrieved November 3, 2026. Public domain (U.S. government work). Permitted

   Reliability: Government. Census counts applications for federal employer ID numbers and flags those likely to become employers. FRED republishes the series unchanged.

9. Census Bureau Business Formation Statistics via FRED, BAHBATOTALNSAUS Monthly high-propensity business applications, United States, not seasonally adjusted

   Retrieved November 3, 2026. Public domain (U.S. government work). Permitted

   Reliability: Government. Same Census program as the Washington series.

10. FRED, resident population WAPOP (Census) and B230RC0A052NBEA (BEA) Annual population of Washington and the U.S. (U.S. series https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/B230RC0A052NBEA), used for per-person rates

    Retrieved November 3, 2026. Public domain (U.S. government work). Permitted

    Reliability: Government. Census Bureau and Bureau of Economic Analysis population estimates.

11. Washington Employment Security Department, Monthly Employment Report charts workbook, September 2026 Over-the-year job change by industry, September 2025 to September 2026 (sheet 'Industry employment OTY, nsa', updated October 14, 2026)

    Retrieved November 3, 2026. Public record (Washington state government). Permitted

    Reliability: Government. ESD's monthly survey-based estimates (Current Employment Statistics), revised when benchmarked to tax records.

12. Deseret News Brian Heywood's statement on losing businesses

    Retrieved November 3, 2026. All rights reserved (quoted under fair use). Link only; short quotation

    Reliability: News report. News report by Emily Walker quoting Heywood directly.

13. Washington Policy Center Commentary claiming a business exodus, May 28, 2026

    Retrieved November 3, 2026. All rights reserved (quoted under fair use). Link only; short quotation

    Reliability: Advocacy group. Has a stake in this finding. A Washington think tank that argues for lower taxes and less regulation. The piece is by its director of small business policy.

14. InvestmentNews Fisher Investments headquarters move, March 27, 2023

    Retrieved November 3, 2026. All rights reserved. Link only

    Reliability: News report. Trade news report.

15. Southern Business & Development Avalara headquarters now Durham, June 24, 2024

    Retrieved November 3, 2026. All rights reserved. Link only

    Reliability: News report. Economic-development trade publication quoting the company.

16. KIRO 7 Payscale headquarters change, December 8, 2025

    Retrieved November 3, 2026. All rights reserved. Link only

    Reliability: News report. Local TV news report.

17. Trade & Industry Development Starbucks Nashville office, April 22, 2026

    Retrieved November 3, 2026. All rights reserved. Link only

    Reliability: News report. Economic-development trade publication reporting the Tennessee announcement.

18. KIRO 7 Columbia Bank executive office in Arizona, October 2026

    Retrieved November 3, 2026. All rights reserved. Link only

    Reliability: News report. Local TV news report summarizing the Puget Sound Business Journal.

Limitations and reproducibility

Reproducible: build.js recomputes every table and saved analysis from three input files: sec-submissions.json (SEC EDGAR submissions API), official-series.json (BLS QCEW, Census Business Formation Statistics via FRED, population, and the ESD September 2026 workbook, copied from the sources listed) and warn-notices.csv (ESD WARN database). Run node build.js. The input numbers can be re-pulled from the source URLs.

• Headquarters are checked for 14 large Washington-based public companies, chosen as the best-known large employers; it is not every company ever based in Washington. Private companies other than Nordstrom are not covered.
• The 1,000-plus worker count is of worksites (establishments), not companies. One company can run several such sites, and a company can be headquartered elsewhere. Counts are for the first quarter of each year.
• Washington's business counts in the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages (QCEW) fell sharply between 2022 and 2023 and swing more than the U.S. series, which points to changes in how employers' accounts are recorded. Long comparisons across 2022-23 are unreliable; the first-quarter 2026 figures are preliminary.
• Layoff notices are not comparable before and after July 27, 2025, when Washington's own notice law took effect. It covers employers with 50 or more workers and counts layoffs statewide, where the federal law covers employers with 100 or more and counts by site. Farm and orchard notices appear almost only after that date.
• Layoff notices show planned layoffs at Washington sites. They do not show relocations, actual separations, or rehiring, and seasonal farm notices recur each year.
• Farm and orchard notices are flagged by employer name (farm-employer-names.txt). Farm labor contractors and growers with generic names, such as Borton & Sons, are counted as other employers, so the farm share is a lower bound.
• New business filings (high-propensity business applications) are applications likely to become employers, not businesses actually opened.