Dallas Slipping As a Top Performer? High Housing Costs Threaten the Region's Allure
Dallas regularly ranks among the best-performing metros in the country, but its halo appears to be dimming, and that was before a record ice storm paralyzed power for a week.
The Dallas-Plano-Irving area ranked 14th among 200 large metros, according to an annual analysis of best-performing cities by the Milken Institute. The report, released last week, measures a dozen indicators, including long- and short-term job creation, output growth and wage gains, especially in technology sectors.
Ranking No. 14 would be a strong showing for most places, far higher than metro giants Los Angeles, New York and Houston. It’s also well ahead of neighboring Fort Worth-Arlington, which was No. 35.
But this is the first time Dallas-Plano-Irving dropped out of the Milken Institute’s top 10 since 2012. And in four of the previous five years, Dallas ranked in the top five.
What happened?
Measures of housing affordability and broadband access were added to the index this year, and Dallas didn’t perform well on those scores related to economic inclusion and infrastructure. “There are some things about Dallas that are really going in the right direction and have continued very strongly, especially on jobs and wages,” said Misael Galdamez, co-author of the report and senior policy analyst at the Milken Institute’s Center for Regional Economics...
