Transitioning out of the military, moving a family to a new place, and finding a job is stressful. Finding a great place to live and raise a family can be one thing, but finding a job can be another. How do you bring the two together?
Recently WalletHub came out with their report 2016’s Best & Worst Cities to Find a Job. What is interesting is how the list of the top ten cities differed depending on the ranking category selected. For example, when looking at strictly the Job Market Ranking, the top 10 cities listed were:
- Irving, TX
- Plano, TX
- Salt Lake City, UT
- Austin, TX
- Overland Park, KS
- Des Moines, IA
- Irvine, CA
- Sioux Falls, SD
- San Francisco, CA
- Fort Lauderdale, FL
However, when the Socio-Economic ranking was chosen, which included data such as safety, commute times, housing affordability, median income adjusted for cost of living, etc., the list looked like this:
- Boise, ID
- Madison, WI
- Lincoln, NE
- Overland Park, KS
- Chandler, AZ
- Omaha, NE
- Scottsdale, AZ
- Plano, TX
- Sioux Falls, SD
- Gilbert, AZ
When comparing the two lists, three cities stood out as being on both lists:
- Overland Park, KS
- Plano, TX
- Sioux Falls, SD
By further drilling down and looking at a specific data set for each city, we see the following:
- Population: 174,503
- Unemployment Rate:2%
- Average Commute Time:06 minutes
- Median Home Price: $258,400
- Main Job Sector: Service including health care, retail trade, professional and technical services, finance and insurance, and information technology.
- Population: 278,480
- Unemployment Rate:3%
- Average Commute Time:58 minutes
- Median Home Price: $249,200
- Main Job Sector: Corporate Campuses, including Capital One Financial Services, Toyota Motor Sales, U.S.A., JP Morgan Chase, Pizza Hut, Siemens PLM Software just to name a few.
Sioux Falls, SD
- Population: 154,526
- Unemployment Rate:4%
- Average Commute Time:16 minutes
- Median Home Price: $149,700
- Main Job Sector: Financial Services, including Wells Fargo, Citigroup, Capital One, First Premier Bank and many others. This is due in part to South Dakota not having a state corporate income tax.
Data Source: http://www.bestplaces.net/find/
One commonality shared by all three cities is their location; all are in the Midwest with only 850 miles between the farthest two. However, one big difference is their proximity to larger population areas. Overland Park, KS and Plano, TX are both part of larger metro areas, namely Kansas City and Dallas. Sioux Falls, SD is a standalone city.
If you are transitioning out of the military or have just graduated from college and are looking for a place to work and raise a family, any of these three cities would be a great choice. And if you like to hunt upland game, South Dakota is one of the best states for Ring-necked Pheasant.
