Cities Where The Recession Is Easing
Uncle Sam as a Recession Shield
Government spending hasn't hurt Austin, Texas, either. It's the seat of state government and tied for No. 1 on our list of 10 cities best surviving the recession. Jobs have been lost nearly everywhere in the last three years, but between December 2007 and December 2009 the number of jobs in Austin rose by 0.98%; more than any of the other major cities we looked at. And by three years from now, jobs are expected to grow by 8.09%, the second-best job outlook on our list. Third on the list is Dallas, home to a thriving technology and energy sector, where jobs are projected to jump 7.19% in three years.
Behind the Numbers
To find the cities where the recession was easing, Forbes looked for a relatively low unemployment rate, using December 2009 figures, the most recent available, and the rate of job growth between December 2007 and December 2009, both from the Bureau of Labor statistics. We sought cities where economists expected that jobs would keep growing, based on the three-year job-growth forecast from Moody's Economy.com; we also looked for metros with the highest positive change in median sale price for single-family homes between the third and fourth quarter of 2009, according to the National Association of Realtors. Finally, we factored in Metropolitan Gross Domestic Product--the dollar amount of goods and services produced within a metro area--provided for 2008, the most recent available, by Moody's.
Forbes ranked the 40 largest Metropolitan Statistical Areas for which it had comprehensive data (that excludes Nashville, Tennn. and Detroit, Mich.) on all these measures, then averaged the rankings for a final score.
Good Fortune In The Lone Star State
If one state is a poster child for economic recovery, it's Texas, home to four of the 10 cities on our list. There's more to why Austin, Dallas, San Antonio and Houston are faring well than just the state's energy industry. The tech, government and education industries supplement the oil state's riches. As for housing, cities in Texas didn't see the same run-up in home prices and rampant speculation that led to the spectacular bubble burst elsewhere in the country.
"The housing market got lucky, if you want to look at it that way," says James P. Gaines, research economist at the Real Estate Center at Texas A&M University. "We didn't have excessive overbuilding, so we don't have a big overhang of unsold new homes, and because Texas has among most affordable housing in the country, the demand sustained."
Like Austin and Dallas, Houston, tied for No. 4 on the list, is expected to experience a three-year 7.03% rise in jobs. But nowhere are jobs projected to grow more than in San Antonio, where four military bases should help drive its expected 8.32% increase.