By Prashant Gopal (Business Week), October 22, 2009
A combination of stable home prices and sizable sectors in health care, energy, government, and education kept these metropolitan areas relatively stable.
America's strongest economies have one thing in common—home prices that never got too hot or too cold.
Home prices in metros such as San Antonio, Oklahoma City, Pittsburgh, Rochester, Little Rock, Ark., and Baton Rouge, La., remained steady through boom and bust. Although no metropolitan area entirely avoided the economic downturn, the most resilient metros were protected by a potent mix of recession-resistant jobs.
The upstate New York areas of Syracuse, Rochester, Albany, and Buffalo suffered from declining jobs in manufacturing, but got significant boosts from sizable health-care, education, and government sectors. Construction is booming in Baton Rouge, Louisiana's capital, as firms take advantage of financing for post-Katrina hurricane recovery work and service-related companies expand to meet the needs of a growing population. Omaha and the state of Iowa have relatively strong insurance sectors.
Texas, the last state to enter recession, has been bolstered by its oil and gas industries—which have also helped Oklahoma, North Dakota, and Louisiana. Texas also has many other things going for it, including affordable home prices and relatively low wages, which attract corporations.
BusinessWeek.com used data and analysis from the Brookings Institution's new MetroMonitor to come up with the nation's 40 strongest economies. The MetroMonitor, which measures the nation's health on a quarterly basis, ranks the top 100 metros based on job growth, unemployment, gross metropolitan product, and home prices.
BusinessWeek.com used data and analysis from the Brookings Institution's new MetroMonitor to come up with the nation's 40 strongest economies. The MetroMonitor, which measures the nation's health on a quarterly basis, ranks the top 100 metros based on job growth, unemployment, gross metropolitan product, and home prices.
Little Rock-North Little Rock-Conway, AR
The economy in Little Rock, the state capital, has remained strong though the local unemployment rate has been rising. Windstream, a telecom services provider based in Little Rock, recently announced it would eliminate 350 jobs by January. Employment in the Little Rock metro peaked in the first quarter of last year. Gross metropolitan product in the second quarter was down just 2.8% from the peak in the third quarter of 2008. Home prices grew 3% in the second quarter compared with the same period a year earlier.
And the unemployment rate in June was 6.6%, up 2.1 points from a year earlier. (Please see below for the various criteria used by the Brookings Institution to determine the overall ranking.)
Job growth (since peak) rank: 11
Gross Metro Product (since peak) rank: 24
Unemployment change (year over year) rank: 7
Home price change (year over year) rank:11