California is dreaming. Where else in the world do regular homes go for well over $2 million bucks? There are cracks in that foundation. As an aside, take a look at the chart. The top three holdings in the MSCI USA Growth Index are: Apple, Amazon.com, and Facebook. Look familiar?
Source: BofA Merrill Lynch Global Investment Strategy
Now forget about this chart. It’s scary. I don’t want to scare you.
I want to point you to one of my favorite annual reports.
Every year around this time, like Christmas in May, demographer Joel Kotkin and Pepperdine University public policy professor Michael Shires publish The Best Small and Medim-Size Cities For Jobs 2017. I’ll talk about that more fully in another post. But today I want to point out one part of the report to you.
Here’s where it gets fun.
In this year’s edition for the largest cities, for the first time this decade, San Francisco lost its No. 1 slot to, drum roll please, Dallas.
Dallas?
You got it.
As Kotkin points out, Dallas, like most other fastest-growing metros, boasts lower costs and taxes, and has created more middle-class jobs than its California rivals.
Haven’t we been pointing out that Texas is open for business? It’s no joke.
Taxes and costs actually do matter to businesses.
And being able to buy a regular home for less than $2 million bucks is important to employees too.
OK, California is not dead. Kotkin notes that the San Francisco area which includes San Mateo remains vibrant.
But, as Kotkin explains from his extensive number crunching: “More troubling may be the weakening of the adjacent San Jose/Silicon Valley economy, which dropped six places to eighth — respectable, but not the kind of superstar performance we have seen over the past several years.”
