Because it crossed the 500,000 mark in population, the Durham NC MSA is included for the first time in the MarketWatch “best of” measures.
Also new this year in the “best places for business” methodology are new and improved metrics for tourism just released this month and signaling the growing influence of visitor centric economic and cultural development for communities.
Durham is the core city and county for the four-county metropolitan statistical area also including Chatham, Orange and Person.
Further illustrating Durham’s continuing emergence as a visitor destination, the marketplace methodology catapulted it into a tie for 11th place, highest among those in North Carolina and tied with Salt Lake City just behind Seattle.
The next highest metro area in North Carolina, Raleigh-Cary actually dropped two notches from 15th in 2009 to 17th with the new tourism-inclusive methodology. The MSA centered around Charlotte fell from 18th to 28th.
MarketWatch, published by Dow Jones & Co., tracks the pulse of markets for engaged investors with more than 16 million visitors per month. The site is a leading innovator in business news, personal finance information, real-time commentary and investment tools and data.
MarketWatch is also a part of the Wall Street Journal Digital Network. Like some other analyses of this type the editorial about the rankings mistakenly substitutes “cities” for “MSAs.” Metropolitan Statistical Areas are census groupings of several cities, towns and counties.
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