Arizona slips in rankings for business appeal
Gov. Doug Ducey’s reputation as a CEO who knows what businesses want will get a quick test.
Arizona’s ranking among states fell in a pair of annual business-related ratings last week. The sky isn’t falling based on either one, but together the ratings may contribute to a sense that the state has lost momentum in business recruiting.
On Friday, Chief Executive magazine rated Arizona ninth on its 2015 survey of best states to do business. That’s good, but it’s down two spots from the year before.
Earlier in the week, Site Selection magazine released its annual list of the nation’s most notable business deals in 2014, and nothing in Arizona made the cut.
In between those events, economists with Arizona State University may have offered an explanation at an economic forecast event Wednesday.
“2015 is going to be the best year yet for this recovery,” said Lee McPheters, director of the JPMorgan Chase Economic Outlook Center at the W.P. Carey School of Business at ASU. “Other states are doing remarkably well, and they’re doing remarkably well across the board.” Texas finished No. 1 in the Chief Exec
utive survey, holding onto its ranking from 2014. Florida again finished second.
“Since the recession began in December 2007, 1.2 million net jobs have been created in Texas, while 700,000 net jobs were created in the other 49 states combined,” the magazine noted. “From climate to transportation to cost of living, Texas has proven it can’t be beat.”
Nevada finished eighth on the list and it also did well in Site Selection’s lists, largely because it landed the Tesla Motors “gigafactory” that Arizona had been competing to attract. That deal helped Nevada hold its ranking with Chief Exec- utive.
Georgia jumped five spots to No. 5, in part because it secured a deal bringing Mercedes-Benz. Sealing the deal seems a key consideration.
Georgia and Arizona each received 3 1/2 stars for taxation and regulation and workforce quality. Arizona ranked slightly higher on living environment and was nearly the same on the state and local tax burden. Still, Georgia moved up to fifth while Arizona slipped to ninth.
California finished last in the survey of executives, who unloaded on the state’s higher-tax business environment.
“California is a deeply troubled state with a problematic infrastructure and social issues. Businesses in the state are so highly regulated that most cannot afford to do business and elected officials do not have any business experience/understanding,” they said.
Perhaps, but job-growth numbers suggest business is getting by in the Golden State.
As of March, California was fifth-best in the nation in job growth on a percentage basis, McPheters noted last week. By comparison, Florida was second, Georgia was seventh, Nevada was (again) eighth, Texas was 12th and Arizona was 14th. Utah finished first in job creation and 15th in the survey.