Arizona’s Business Climate ranking brought down by Education

by David Safier

I'm not one to put much stock in how business journalists rank states' business climate. They put all kinds of variables in a hopper, perform some kind of regression analysis (I suppose) and decide which state is the best for business. What kind of business — low wage, high wage, manufacturing, high tech? They don't say.

With that caveat, CNBC gave Arizona 24th place for its business climate, right in the middle. We slipped 6 spots from last year's number 18.

We actually have the nation's highest ranking on Workforce. Does that mean we have the cheapest, most plentiful labor? Here's a hint: more union membership gives a state a lower ranking. We're 10th in Infrastructure and transportion (which really surprises me), 13th in Business friendliness, 18th in both Access to capital and Technology and innovation. We're in the 30s for Quality of life, Cost of living and Cost of doing business. Our economy is 44th.

And — Drum roll, please — we come in 49th on Education.

In case you're interested, the 5 states with the top overall ranking are Virginia, Texas, North Carolina, Georgia and Colorado.