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When Google first planted a flag in South Carolina in 2007, quietly opening a data center in Berkeley County’s Moncks Corner, few would have predicted what that single investment would become. Nearly two decades and $4.5 billion later, the company has committed another $9 billion to the state through 2027—expanding existing campuses, building new ones and deepening its role in Google’s global AI infrastructure network. As Ruth Porat, Alphabet and Google’s president and chief investment officer, put it, the company is building on a 15-year foundation to help secure South Carolina’s success “during the next wave of American innovation.”
The investment is a headline, but the real story is what it required: years of unglamorous work—power, workforce, roads, sites, permitting—so the state was ready when the next investment wave showed up. Versions of that same build-the-basics story are unfolding elsewhere. Ohio assembles a portfolio that includes Intel, Joby Aviation and Anduril. North Dakota lands a low-emissions steel project that legacy steel states couldn’t. North Carolina pulls in climate-tech founders who once would have defaulted to the coasts. The map is shifting—slowly in perception, faster in capital.
That shift matters in a semiquincentennial moment. As the country nears 250 years, the balance between states and Washington is still one of the defining American tensions—and one of its most productive engines. The Founders argued about power, but they understood competition: States would rival one another for commerce, industry and people. Two centuries later, that constructive rivalry is still reshaping where the next era of growth concentrates—and where it doesn’t.
Chief Executive’s 2026 Best & Worst States for Business survey, based on hundreds of CEO responses, shows both continuity and churn. Texas remains No. 1 and Florida No. 2, with Tennessee, North Carolina and Georgia rounding out the top five. But below the top tier, movement is meaningful. South Carolina jumped seven spots to No. 6 on the strength of those Google-style fundamentals. Ohio climbed five places to No. 7, the highest-ranked Midwestern state, helped by aggressive, targeted marketing and great storytelling, along with a sustained focus on upskilling talent already in the workforce.
In the middle of the pack, the shifts are quieter—but they’re the kind that show up later as a new factory, a new employer, a new reason a family decides to stay. Wyoming, Wisconsin and Missouri each climbed four spots this year, and Wisconsin’s move builds on last year’s nine-place jump—momentum that’s starting to look structural, not just statistical noise. Pennsylvania rose five places to No. 26, another sign that CEO perceptions can change when a state keeps showing up, year after year, with the basics done well. “The states focusing on the fundamentals—talent, infrastructure, tax and regulatory climate—are the ones that will continue to do well,” says site selection expert Larry Gigerich, executive managing director of Ginovus consultants.
Global futurist Jim Carroll puts it less diplomatically. Some states, he says, are still acting like the future is optional. “There are states in denial about the reality of where the future is going and those that are not—those that are not will have the opportunity.” In his view, the winners won’t be the ones that win the next incentives bidding war—they’ll be the ones that build the conditions that make investment inevitable: serious R&D, modern grid technology, real alignment between business and universities, incubators that produce companies and skills training that doesn’t quit after the ribbon cutting.
Taken together, the rankings and the interviews with CEOs, economists and economic development experts point to the same conclusion: As America heads into its 250th year, “winning the future” isn’t a mystery strategy. It’s execution—relentless, often unflashy execution—across a handful of fundamentals that compound over time.
The most powerful force remapping the long-term business landscape isn’t a single tax tweak or incentive package—it’s where people are actually going. In the newest Census estimates released earlier this year, South Carolina’s population grew 1.5 percent between July 2024 and July 2025—faster than any other state and roughly three times the national rate—marking its second straight year as the country’s growth leader.
For Dr. Joseph Von Nessen, a research economist at the University of South Carolina’s Darla Moore School of Business, that kind of growth is the state’s “secret sauce.” In-migration doesn’t just add consumers, he argues; it adds workers and taxpayers—and it accelerates demand for housing, healthcare and services that, in turn, supports a broader mix of industries.
But Von Nessen stresses a nuance CEOs can’t afford to miss: Headline growth matters far less than who is moving and why. A state drawing young engineers and founders has a very different trajectory from one fueled primarily by retirees—different labor supply, different wage pressure, different long-term dynamism.
For CEOs like Natasha August, founder of Dallas-based creator platform RM11, that distinction isn’t theoretical. Texas is pulling the working-age talent her company needs—at price points that make both hiring and retention easier. “Everything around Dallas and in Texas in general is just more reasonable to live here,” she says. “Thus, the employee retention is a lot higher for us.”
Outside today’s growth corridor, Michigan may be the clearest example of a comeback beginning to register. After decades of decline, it posted four straight years of population gains and recorded its first net in-migration in 35 years—early evidence that its value proposition is resonating again with both companies and families. The state did slip seven places to No. 24 in this year’s ranking, but that reads less like a verdict than a transition as Michigan works to move from a recession-sensitive, auto-heavy profile toward a more diversified, “recession-resilient” mix in technology and life sciences—without abandoning its core automotive base, says Michelle Grinnell of the Michigan Economic Development Corporation.
Michigan, Grinnell adds, isn’t “competing to be the cheapest state” to do business. “But we believe we deliver the greatest value, both to companies and to people,” she adds pointing to a unified “Team Michigan” approach. Concierge-style coordination across agencies, early engagement on permitting and a closer match between projects, communities and sites allow for companies to “get one answer” and “no surprises,” the kind of execution CEOs prize when they’re making long-horizon bets.
And for all the attention on the Sunbelt, several CEOs argue the Midwest’s strengths are still badly underestimated. “I’m tired of people believing that the only software companies that exist are on the West and East Coasts—and that’s just completely untrue,” says Sean Donegan, founder and CEO of AI-driven geospatial analytics firm Satelytics in Perrysburg, Ohio. “The Midwest is greatly undervalued. People here are incredibly smart, loyal, trustworthy and honest—key attributes for any successful business.”
It’s never been more about the people—and whether a state can reliably turn people into capacity. The states pulling ahead treat talent less like a static asset and more like an operating system: recruit it, train it, match it, hold onto it and keep upgrading it as industries change.
That logic drew Steven Boal to relocate Matia Mobility from the Bay Area, where the logistics of manufacturing “were becoming prohibitive,” to Salt Lake City. “Utah’s greatest asset is its demographics,” he says. “The brain drain has reversed. We are seeing more talent stay in Utah post-graduation, and more experienced leaders moving here for the quality of life, which helps us tackle the pipeline challenge from both ends.” Proximity matters, too, he adds—especially to research engines like the University of Utah and BYU. “These universities aren’t just churning out graduates—they are actively commercializing technology and fostering an entrepreneurial mindset in their engineering departments.”
South Carolina has built its own version of that system around scale and speed: a technical college network paired with readySC and Apprenticeship Carolina—programs Commerce Secretary Harry Lightsey calls “best-in-class examples of what workforce development can and should look like.” Nearly 2.5 million South Carolinians are now employed, and the working-age participation rate sits above 82 percent—numbers Lightsey says reflect decades of alignment between education providers and employers.
Ohio tells a similar story, but with an emphasis on customization. JobsOhio CEO J.P. Nauseef points to deep STEM pipelines, community colleges that build bespoke programs around employers’ five- to 10-year forecasts and sustained investment in upskilling adults already in the workforce—not just new graduates. “If we don’t have the talent, we’ll develop a program to certify the type of talent they need with one of the many community colleges and four-year degree-granting institutions and job centers,” he says. That approach helped Ohio land capital-intensive projects, including Intel’s multibillion-dollar chip fabs, the Honda–LG EV power-systems complex and Joby Aviation’s air-taxi manufacturing hub.
For CEOs, the question is shifting from “Can I find workers here?” to “Can this state keep producing—and retaining—the mix of skills I’ll need as AI, automation and new energy systems roll through my industry?” Increasingly, the answer comes down to how tightly business and education are linked, and how fast that joint system can adapt when the next technology wave hits.
In this cycle, power is no longer a late-stage detail; it is a go/no go screen at the top of the funnel. Data centers, EV supply chains and high-intensity manufacturing are forcing a new kind of due diligence: Before incentives, before labor, before ribbon cuttings, CEOs want to know one thing: Can the site reliably power the operation, every hour of every day?
North American Iron’s decision to build a multibillion-dollar, low-emissions pig iron facility in Minot, North Dakota—skipping traditional steel states like Indiana and West Virginia—shows how quickly the map can change when energy pencils out. CEO Jim Bougalis points to a combination he says was difficult to replicate elsewhere: abundant, cost-competitive natural gas, grid reliability built for 24/7 operations and a carbon-storage framework he calls “unmatched in North America.”
“North Dakota spent more than a decade putting rules in place so companies can safely store captured CO2 underground under a clear, state-run permitting process,” Bougalis says, noting that “energy certainty” is a non-negotiable and a close second is regulatory clarity. “Companies don’t need fast or loose, they need predictable. North Dakota’s consistency and transparency in permitting allowed us to make long-term commitments with confidence.”
Ohio has been similarly deliberate about removing friction from the power question. House Bill 15 aims to compress energy-project permitting timelines; designated energy-infrastructure zones and behind-the-meter rules give large users more options; and a $100 million initiative is designed to unlock more of the state’s natural-gas base for industrial customers. Nauseef puts the goal plainly: Power should never be the reason a project dies in Ohio. “We have programs to get power there quickly,” he says.
South Carolina brings a different asset: A nuclear dominant grid that generates more than half its electricity from reactors, providing exactly the kind of 24/7 baseload that data center operators and advanced manufacturers crave. That’s part of why grid hardware maker Eaton saw it as fertile ground and last year invested $340 million to build a third U.S. manufacturing facility for three-phase transformers, part of the broader investment push that has totaled $1 billion since 2023.
For some manufacturers, the question goes beyond what the grid can provide to whether the state makes it practical to generate power on-site. Nathan Silvernail, founder and CEO of Plantd, says his climate-tech manufacturing company generates its power from waste-biomass gasification and is adding solar capacity. He chose rural Oxford, North Carolina, in part because he found fewer layers of permitting and fewer punitive tariffs. “A state that makes it easy to feed excess power back to the grid or offset industrial consumption with on-site generation changes our operating economics significantly,” Silvernail says. He adds that industrial power rates in rural areas can lag when utilities haven’t invested ahead of demand.
The takeaway CEOs kept returning to is straightforward: Treat the energy briefing as a starting point, not an afterthought. Ask early about grid capacity and timelines, reliability, behind-the-meter options, interconnection process, nuclear posture and carbon strategy. If the answers are vague—or slow—move on.
“Infrastructure” used to mean roads and bridges. Today, it means throughput and time: port capacity, rail connections, broadband, truly shovel-ready sites—and the simple operational question every CEO ends up asking: Can my inputs arrive and my product leave at the speed my business requires?
Arizona is a live case study in what happens when growth outruns the systems meant to support it. Last year, the state slipped several places in the rankings as population growth and inbound investment began to strain the grid and the built environment. Since then, regulators and utilities have moved to catch up—approving nearly 5,000 megawatts of new generation and storage, launching multibillion-dollar grid-expansion plans and directing new funding into resilience upgrades serving 1.6 million customers. “As Arizona continues to grow, we must ensure the power grid keeps pace to meet the growing energy demands of the future,” says Nick Myers, chair of the Arizona Corporation Commission. “Every megawatt and mile of transmission approved by the Commission represent more than growth and economic development—they represent a more reliable and resilient grid and a commitment to long-term energy security for families and businesses across the state.”
That logic shows up not only in megawatts and lane miles, but in the day-to-day math of serving customers. Luca Cacioli, CEO of CEIA USA, says his company—based in Hudson, Ohio—recently chose Phoenix for a regional training center it expects to open in early 2026, as growth accelerates in the Southwest. Proximity mattered, he says: Team members and clients are already concentrated in Arizona and surrounding states, and “coming out of the pandemic, being physically accessible really matters.”
Another advantage was operational ease. “You also can’t beat Phoenix when it comes to ease of travel,” he says, pointing to fast highway access to California and Mexico and to an infrastructure profile that reduces friction for teams that spend a lot of time on the road. Grid access and connectivity were essential as well, he adds, because customers need to experience CEIA’s high-tech systems “in real life conditions,” and global coordination depends on reliable digital infrastructure.
The state’s catchup is visible on the ground, too. ADOT has begun a $410 million widening of I-10 between Phoenix and Casa Grande, part of a broader effort to keep freight moving between Phoenix, Tucson, California and Mexico. Those kinds of concrete steps—less slogan, more steel—helped Arizona climb two spots this year to No. 8.
Texas is confronting a different constraint: water. “Because of all the growth they’ve had, the water resources are getting really pressured in a significant way,” says Gigerich. The state, he adds, is coming to the realization that it needs a water plan “for the next 50 years.”
Ohio’s infrastructure advantage is less headline-friendly but often more decisive in practice: preparedness. Through years of work by port authorities and local partners, the state has assembled one of the Midwest’s deepest inventories of development-ready industrial sites—land where utilities, zoning, access and due diligence are largely complete. For CEOs operating on tight timelines, that kind of pre-work can be the difference between a feasible project and a missed cycle.
Speed is the throughline for CEOs looking to plant roots. Silvernail, whose company converts declining tobacco land into carbon negative building materials platforms, didn’t just need a factory—he needed an ecosystem that could move fast: thousands of acres of suitable land near the plant, logistics to truck biomass efficiently, industrial power at a workable rate, and the ability to hire both robotics engineers and farm workers in the same county. “Innovation is moving to where you can build things, not where you can pitch things,” he says. “Governors should understand that companies like ours aren’t looking for innovation districts—we’re looking for cheap industrial real estate, accessible electricity, ag land and workforces that can handle both hard physical manufacturing and advanced automation.”
Some founders are rediscovering legacy corridors for exactly that reason. Food-tech startup Savor based its first 25,000-square-foot facility in Batavia, Illinois, by buying a fats-and-oils plant it already used as a tolling partner. “It was the exact kind of infrastructure our company needed,” says co-founder and CEO Kathleen Alexander. The plant already held key permits and local officials were “welcoming and supportive,” so her team was able to focus on equipment upgrades instead of “navigating a long regulatory process.” In her view, Illinois’ deep food-manufacturing ecosystem—talent, suppliers and nearby corporate headquarters—can offset higher labor costs.
“Business friendly” used to be shorthand for tax rates and incentives. CEOs now use it more literally: How fast can I get a straight answer? How predictable is the process? And when something breaks—permitting, inspections, utilities—does the state help solve it or add another layer?
In Utah, Boal says the phrase comes down to “accessibility and speed.” In practice, that means regulators and economic-development leaders who pick up the phone—and a permitting process that moves at the pace a regulated medical-device company’s market demands, not the pace of bureaucracy.
Texas offers a similar kind of operating clarity at scale, says Danny Sit, CEO of mobile phone maker NUU, who calls the company’s move from California to Irving in the Dallas–Fort Worth metro “a strategic move that helped set the foundation for our growth.” Texas, he argues, pairs pro-business policies with “a deep and expanding workforce,” plus operating costs that let companies “stay lean while investing more into innovation and customer experience.” Irving’s position inside DFW adds what CEOs value even more than a slogan: central access to distribution, strong infrastructure and proximity to partners and customers “that matter most.”
Florida’s advantage, several founders say, is the day-to-day experience. Sgt. Rags Beef Jerky founder Victor Ragone describes it as “less red tape, fewer hoops and people [who] actually want to help you get things done,” a sharp contrast to his prior experience in Oregon and California. The result is more time building product and distribution, less time fighting process.
Biller Genie founder and CEO Thomas Aronica makes a similar case for Orlando, which he says is “big enough to recruit and scale, but not so expensive or noisy that it pressures you into bad hiring and bloated burn.” STEM-heavy universities, a growing tech ecosystem and a lower cost base than Miami make internships, recruiting and retention “more actionable than in many ‘brand-name’ hubs,” while Orlando airport’s nonstop routes help keep go-to-market teams in front of customers without “turning travel into a weekly tax on the team.”
South Carolina has branded that operating style more explicitly as being a “handshake state.” Commerce Secretary Harry Lightsey argues that a shared pro-business mindset and coordination “at all levels—local, regional and state” allow decisions to be made quickly and commitments to be kept. For CEOs weighing 20- or 30-year investments, that reputation can matter as much as any incentive matrix.
Ohio’s JobsOhio model codifies the same principle. It functions as a single front door, orchestrating across a home-rule patchwork so companies don’t have to navigate it alone. Deals are built around the real constraints—power, water, sites, buildings, talent and timing—and incentives are structured to pay back through payroll taxes in under two years, on average. Over the next 20 years, the gap between the states that operate with that sort of ease and those that don’t will only widen. As Alexander sees it, CEOs should look for the states that already have the ecosystem they need and are actively working to remove barriers. “Bureaucracy kills or significantly hampers innovation,” she says, adding that states need to “pair their regional strengths with a regulatory environment that moves at the speed of innovation. Do those two things—leverage what’s already there and clear the red tape—and they’ll win the industries that define the next century.”
Without a forward-looking lens, even a well-run process can produce the wrong outcome.
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