by Think Currituck, on 7/12/17 11:19 AM
North Carolina holds on to the No. 5 spot in CNBC's America's Top States for Business ranking. The state scored 1,568 points out of a possible 2,500 in the annual study.
The best category this year for the state is Technology & Innovation. Last year, NC ranked 7th, this year we moved up to 6th. Our Workforce ranking also improved, going from 9th in 2016 to 7th this year.
Two factors that likely held the state from topping the list? Education and Quality of Life. North Carolina placed 28th for Quality of Life and budget cuts in school spending knocked the state to 32nd place for Education.
CNBC has been scoring the states since 2007 to see how they rank in competitiveness. According to the network, the study reveals "key state economic indicators on everything from taxes and regulatory climate to the quality of their workforces. It’s a project that takes months of data analysis. We score all 50 states on more than 60 measures of competitiveness developed with input from a broad and diverse array of business and policy experts, official government sources, the CNBC Global CFO Council, YPO and the states themselves."
Since 2007, North Carolina has only slipped out of the top ten once. Here's how the state has ranked over the years:
2007: 5th
2008: 6th
2009: 9th
2010: 4th
2011: 3rd
2012: 4th
2013: 12th
2014: 5th
2015: 9th
2016: 5th
