Both Connecticut and New York were in the bottom half of CNBC”™s fifth annual “America”™s Top States for Business” rankings.
In the report, published June 28, Connecticut was ranked 39, down from a ranking of 35 last year. New York dropped from 24 in 2010 to 26.
Virginia and Texas took the top two spots, in what has become a clear trend. In the inaugural study in 2007, Virginia was ranked first and Texas second, and they have traded the top two spots every year since.
The overall rankings were based on 43 different metrics in 10 weighted categories that measured everything from the cost of doing business and the cost of living in a particular state to the quality of life and the strength and diversity of a particular state”™s economy and workforce.
Based on the study”™s findings, New York was ranked among the top three in three different categories: education, where took the top spot, technology and innovation, where it was ranked second, and access to capital, where it was ranked third.
However, those high marks were offset by several lower rankings, including dismal feedback in the cost of doing business category, where New York ranked 48th. The only states that were ranked worse were Alaska and Hawaii. Other low points for New York included a ranking of 49 in the workforce category and a ranking of 45 in the cost of living category.
The biggest change New York experienced in any of the 10 categories came in the measurement of the diversity and strength of the state”™s economy, where New York dropped from 2nd place in 2010 to 20th this year.
The study awarded Connecticut high marks for its education system and overall quality of life, where it ranked third and 11th, respectively. The good news ended there, with Connecticut ranking 40th or worse in half of the categories that were examined.
The state was ranked 45th in the category measuring the cost of doing business, 43rd in the category measuring infrastructure and transportation, 44th in the category examining its economy, 40th in the category gauging business friendliness, and 47th in the category measuring the cost of living.
In several categories, Connecticut experienced marked drops from 2010, including business friendliness, where it dropped from 23rd to 40th, and the economy, where it dropped from 32nd to 44th. The state did experience a jump from 40th to 33rd in the category that ranked the overall quality of each state”™s workforce.
