AUSTIN – Chief Executive magazine’s ranking of Texas as America’s top state for business for the eighth year in a row further validates the free-market, limited-government actions taken by Texas policymakers, according to the Texas Public Policy Foundation.
“Businesses gravitate toward states and communities where they have the best chance to succeed,” said Chuck DeVore, the Foundation’s Senior Fellow for Fiscal Policy. “And they’re voting for Texas not merely in magazine surveys but also with their feet.”
Chief Executive surveyed 650 business leaders, asking them to grade the states in which they do business among a variety of areas, including tax and regulation, quality of workforce, and living environment. Texas once again topped the overall rating, with Florida leapfrogging North Carolina for second place.
During the last five years, Texas’ seasonally-adjusted non-farm employment has increased by 462,000, while that of the United States as a whole has declined by 4.51 million.
“Texas policymakers understand that regulations operate as a hidden drag on entrepreneurial activity,” said Talmadge Heflin, the Foundation’s Director of Fiscal Policy. “So they seek to limit them to the extent that they are needed for the public good.”
The business leaders surveyed by Chief Executive rated California, New York, and Illinois as the worst states for business.
Chuck DeVore is a Senior Fellow for Fiscal Policy at the Texas Public Policy Foundation.
Talmadge Heflin is director of the Center for Fiscal Policy at the Texas Public Policy Foundation. Heflin served 11 terms in the Texas House and chaired the Appropriations Committee in 2003, leading the Legislature’s successful efforts to close a $10 billion budget deficit without a tax increase.
The Texas Public Policy Foundation is a non-profit, free-market research institute based in Austin.
Primary website: www.TexasPolicy.com Facebook page: www.Facebook.com/TexasPublicPolicyFoundation Twitter feed: www.Twitter.com/TPPF
– 30 –