For the third year in a row, Forbes magazine has ranked Austin as on of the top three cities for businesses and careers! Forbes magazine released its list of best places to jumpstart a business or career on May 5. Regarding Austin, Forbes told readers, "Look for the economy to rebound to 7 percent a year through 2008, thanks to one of the nation's smartest work forces."

Austin's educated and talented workforce is the theme behind the Chamber's on-going marketing campaign, "The Human Capital", and part of the Opportunity Austin initiative aimed at creating 72,000 jobs over a five-year period.

This prestigious ranking is based on six criteria critical to the success of businesses and employees: business costs, living costs, engineers, crime rates, job growth and employment rates. The ranking relies on Economy.com, a research firm which helped weigh the data on business costs, living costs, education levels and job and income growth. Bertrand Sperling, who compiles Sperling Best Places lists, compiled information for a culture-and-leisure index.

Austin was ranked along with 150 metropolitan areas. Austin was Number Three in 2004 and Number One in 2003. This year, Boise, ID ranked Number One and Raleigh-Durham, N.C. came in at Number Two.