Columbia ranks among best places in US to start a career, report shows. Here’s the list
Columbia is among the top 10 best places to start a career in the nation, a new report shows.
According to the WalletHub report, which compared 182 U.S. cities, Columbia ranked 10th among best places to start a career. Charleston was the other South Carolina city ranked and it was 13th on the list.
“New graduates are entering the market at a good time, as the unemployment rate for people ages 20 through 24 is currently 6.9%,” the report states. “The job market has made a huge recovery from the damage done by the COVID-19 pandemic and employers plan to hire 31.6% more graduates from the class of 2022 than they did from the class of 2021.”
To determine the best cities to launch a career, the report compared the 182 cities — including the 150 most populated cities in the U.S. and at least two of the most populated cities in each state — across two key dimensions: professional opportunities and quality of life.
WalletHub evaluated the dimensions using 27 metrics, each of which was graded on a 100-point scale. Some of the metrics included availability of entry-level jobs, monthly average starting salary, annual job growth, the availability of commuter friendly jobs, share of millennial newcomers, housing affordability and projected population growth.
The report then determined each city’s weighted average across all metrics to calculate the overall score.
Below is a list of the top 10 and the bottom 10 ranked cities in the report.
Top 10 best places to start a career
- Salt Lake City, UT
- Orlando, FL
- Atlanta, GA
- Austin, TX
- Seattle, WA
- Boise, ID
- Miami, FL
- Tampa, FL
- Portland, ME
- Columbia, SC
Bottom 10 best places to start a career
- Anchorage, AK
- Long Beach, CA
- Pembroke Pines, FL
- Newark, NJ
- Casper, WY
- Detroit, MI
- Santa Clarita, CA
- New York, NY
- Shreveport, LA
- North Las Vegas, NV
This story was originally published May 16, 2022 at 9:44 AM.
