|
Florida
created jobs at a faster rate than any other part of the
United States in 2003, according to a report by the
Milken Institute published on Tuesday.
The nonprofit research
firm ranked the top 200 cities for job creation last
year, and found that half of the top 10 were in Florida.
The Fort Myers and Cape
Coral area ranked first; West Palm Beach and Boca Raton
placed fourth; Daytona Beach came in fifth; the Sarasota
and Bradenton area came in sixth; and Fort Lauderdale
was ninth.
"The state continues to
enjoy a migration of retirees who all have high demand
for health care and other services including
construction, which is booming," said Ross Duvall, one
of the report's authors.
A resurgence in
tourism, with Florida benefiting from travelers'
preference for domestic destinations over farther-flung
locales, is also related to the state's job prospects.
Not surprisingly, Las
Vegas placed second on the Milken rankings. While the
nation overall lost 0.3 percent of its jobs in 2003, Las
Vegas gained 3.9 percent during the same period.
Duvall pointed out that
the city easily could have taken first place, were it
not for the lower-than-average compensation packages
offered in the market. However, Las Vegas compensates
for that with some of the nation's lowest tax rates.
In addition to the
ongoing boom in tourism, the city's primary industry,
Vegas is seeing a related surge in new-home
construction.
While Las Vegas now has
the fastest-rising real estate prices in the nation,
they're still lower than those of many other cities.
Third on the Milken
list is Phoenix, which "has a high concentration of
high-tech jobs in the defense and security subsectors,"
said Duvall. "The city bounced back from the economic
downturn faster than other tech-heavy areas."
He added that the
city's low real estate prices have attracted numerous
financial-services companies, especially ones based in
California. These firms are moving to Arizona to set up
satellite offices for their technology and support
departments.
Meanwhile, America's
largest supply chain -- Wal-Mart and its suppliers --
put the Arkansas towns of Fayetteville, Springdale and
Rogers in seventh place on Milken's ranking.
Indeed, the
megaretailer's ongoing pressure on business partners
contributes to a steady influx of new employers to the
area.
Two other cities made
the list for providing lower-cost housing alternatives
to major metropolitan areas: Monmouth and Ocean, N.J.,
for long-distance commuting to New York; and Riverside
and San Bernardino, Calif., bearing the same
relationship to Los Angeles.
In both regions,
housing prices tend to be about half of the national
median of $220,000, according to Duvall.
"What the Top 10 cities
all have in common is a high rate of business startups,"
he added. "They also have low business costs and a
fairly educated workplace. They all benefit from high
rates of migration, especially among recent retirees,
and all of that drives up demand for local services."
Cities creating jobs at the fastest pace
1. Fort Myers-Cape
Coral, Florida
2. Las Vegas, Nevada
3. Phoenix-Mesa, Arizona
4. West Palm Beach-Boca Raton, Florida
5. Daytona Beach, Florida
6. Sarasota-Bradenton, Florida
7. Fayetteville-Springdale-Rogers, Arkansas
8. Riverside-San Bernardino, California
9. Fort Lauderdale, Florida
10. Monmouth-Ocean, New Jersey
Source: Milken
Institute |
