The Best Places For Business And Careers

Kurt Badenhausen
,
Forbes Staff
I cover sports business with rare dips into b-schools, local economies

The U.S. economy continues to sputter along with frustratingly high unemployment and sluggish GDP growth, but there are pockets of the country that are booming with 4% unemployment and 8% economic growth. Companies looking to squeeze costs and maximize productivity are increasingly turning to these locales to relocate operations and open new offices.

You won’t find many of these areas on the two coasts. Cities in California and New England are saddled with high business costs and heavy regulatory burdens. States in the heartland, like Utah, Texas, Nebraska and Colorado, have the best business climates right now.

Topping our 14th annual list of The Best Places for Business and Careers is Provo, Utah. The $16 billion economy is thriving largely on the back of Brigham Young University. The school provides a stabilizing presence as the third-largest private college by enrollment in the U.S. The school is also generating new jobs. During 2010 it ranked third in the numbers of start-ups produced through university research—13 in total—behind only the nearby University of Utah (18) and MIT (17).

Job growth was a robust 3% in the Provo metro in 2011, third best in the U.S. It enjoys—by far—the lowest violent crime rate in the U.S. and ranks tenth lowest overall for crime, including property crime. The metro population has doubled over the past two decades to 542,700.

Joining Provo in the top 10 is sixth-ranked Ogden, Utah. Last year, 30 miles north of the city, Procter & Gamble opened its first U.S. manufacturing plant in more than three decades. The $540 million facility will create 1,000 new jobs in the area. Median household incomes in Ogden are a robust $60,625.

To gauge the best places for business in the U.S., we rate the 200 largest metro areas on a dozen factors. Forbes uses data from Moody’s Analytics, the U.S. Census and Bert Sperling, who runs Sperling’s BestPlaces. We consider job metrics, costs, income growth, quality of life, education of the labor force and more (click here for a detailed methodology).

Last year’s top city, Raleigh, N.C., dipped to No. 2 this year as living costs rose to 5% above the national average. Raleigh continues to be an attractive destination for companies with business costs 18% below the national average, according to Moody’s Analytics, and a highly educated workforce thanks to nearby schools like North Carolina State, Duke University and University of North Carolina.