Forbes has released its “Best Cities for Jobs 2014” list and as expected, Texas makes a strong showing on the list in several city-size categories. Forbes looked at short, medium, and long term job creations from 2002 to present and factored in growth momentum (slowing or accelerating) in determining the rankings for best places for jobs (you can read an in-depth look at their methodology here). Forbes also split the list up based on city size; large, medium, and small.
Large Sized Cities in Texas
Forbes defined “large cities” as those with non-farm employment over 450,000. Austin-Round Rock-San Marcos came in #3, Houston-Sugar Land-Baytown came in #5, Dallas-Plano-Irving came in #9, Fort Worth-Arlington came in #11, and San Antonio-New Braunfels came in #12.
Medium Sized Cities in Texas
Forbes defined “medium cities” as those with non-farm employment between 150,00 and 450,000. McAllen-Edinburg-Mission was the only medium sized city to make the Best Cities for Jobs 2014 list, coming in at #9.
Small Sized Cities in Texas
Forbes defined “small cities” as those with less than 150,000 non-farm jobs. Midland came in #6, College Station came in at #9, San Angelo came in at #11, Odessa came in at #15, and Lubbock came in at #16. It’s interesting to note that all of these “small cities” with the exception of College Station fall within oil producing regions.
image courtesy of photologue_np