This month’s issue of Inc. magazine has a list of the best places for doing business in America.  The list contains 274 cities and ranks them using a formula that measures job growth.  To measure growth they looked at current-year growth, average annual growth over three years and growth over the first and second halves of the 10 years ending September, 2004.

Unfortunately for the NC Triad (Greensboro/Winston-Salem/High Point) it ranked 234, down from 147 last year.  It really isn’t a surprise given the hammering that the prominent industries around here (textiles, furniture) have taken.  It will be interesting to see what effect the new Dell plant being built here will have on next year’s ranking.

Me being a glass-half-full kind of guy I look at the Triad as a great entrepreneurial opportunity.  Why?  Lower costs (rent is cheap, labor is abundant, and wages are lower due to low cost of living), good infrastructure, good local universities, and great quality of life.  You also have easy access to other metro areas (1 hour to Charlotte, 1 1/2 hours to Raleigh-Durham, 45 minute flight to DC and Atlanta), so you get the benefit of their business without the traffic. So if you’re an entrepreneur come on in, the water’s great.

Speaking of DC: My old stomping ground, Northern Virginia, leapt from 54 last year to 11
this year.  The magazine attributes it to all the war spending, and
interestingly separates Northern Virginia from DC (28, up from 29) and
the Maryland Suburbs (29, down from 25).