The Milken Institute is based in Southern California, but its annual survey of business conditions in the nation's cities has almost nothing good to say about California.
It heaps praise on Texas - the Austin area was ranked No. 1 on Milken's list of "best-performing cities," released today, while three other Texas cities were listed in the top five, with only No. 3 Salt Lake City cracking that elite list.
Cities in recession-wracked California, meanwhile, saw their rankings decline - especially those hit hard by the collapse of the housing market.
"Metropolitan areas with a high exposure to durable manufacturing also experienced massive job losses and unemployment rates above 12 percent," Milken says. "Major port cities such as Los Angeles witnessed diminished trade and the loss of logistics-related jobs. Even technology production centers saw demand plunge as domestic and foreign businesses curtailed investment in information, communications, software, and related services."
"Perhaps no major metro area has been hit harder by the collapse of the housing market than Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario, California," the report continues. "Just two years ago, buoyed by a strong construction sector that was racing to keep up with an insatiable demand for housing, Riverside ranked 3rd among all large metros in our 2007 index. After dropping fifty places each of the past two years, it has now fallen to 103rd place."
Meanwhile, the report says, "Los Angeles-Long Beach-Glendale, California, has been mired in a slump. The metro area dropped thirteen places for two consecutive years, falling from 126th place last year to 139th in this year's overall rankings.
It also slipped from 8th to 9th place on our list of the nation's ten largest metros. In our indicator for recent job momentum, which examines March 2008 to March 2009, Los Angeles ranked 138th overall for job growth, losing 3.6 percent of its workforce."
While Florida cities dominate Milken's list of "biggest decliners," three California cities are on the 20-city list, including No. 2 Merced. Others are Fresno and Stockton.
The full report is available here.
Torey Van Oot and the Bee Capitol Bureau report on the people and politics of California government. Get 
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