> The Bank of America’s Fall 2014 Small Business Owner Report, which surveyed 1,000 small business owners nationwide, found that half of small business owners were confident their local economies would improve over the next year and 45 percent believed the national economy would improve during that period. Those numbers mark increases from last year’s survey, when 45 percent of small business owners said their local economies would improve and 41 percent said the national economy would improve.

Confidence levels break down along generational lines, with those levels being particularly high among millenials, 82 percent of whom said their local economies would improve over the next 12 months and 74 percent of whom said the national economy would improve during that period. Fifty percent of so-called Gen-Xers and 41 percent of baby boomers believed their local economies would improve over the next year, and 45 percent of Gen-Xers and 35 percent of baby boomers said the national economy would improve.