No government agency ranks states for business. What exists instead is a small set of heavily used private scorecards, and this report synthesizes the two most influential, naming the rater for every claim. The first is CNBC's America's Top States for Business 2025, the latest complete edition, which scored all 50 states on 135 metrics across 10 categories including workforce, infrastructure, economy, and cost of doing business. The second is the Tax Foundation's 2026 State Tax Competitiveness Index, which grades the structure of each state's tax code across more than 120 variables covering individual, corporate, sales, property, and unemployment insurance taxes.
The two raters measure different things and often disagree, which is the point of reading them together. CNBC rewards broad execution: talent, infrastructure, and economic momentum. The Tax Foundation rewards tax design regardless of outcomes. A state that both raters place near the top is strong across the board; a state they split on has a specific, identifiable trade-off, and the narrative names it.
The composite rank here averages a state's standing across the two systems, with ties broken by hard federal data cited in the blurbs (BLS jobs, Census migration). The composite is analytical and ordinal, and every underlying rating is attributed. The framework does not care which party governs a state, and neither rater's methodology asks. Deliberately ignored: press releases, incentive announcements, and every ranking that does not publish its methodology.
", "entries": [ { "rank": 1, "name": "Texas", "detail": "CNBC 2025: No. 2 | No income tax", "score": "95.6", "blurb": "Second on CNBC's 2025 Top States for Business and a perennial top-10 finisher with the Tax Foundation thanks to zero personal income tax (CNBC, 2025; Tax Foundation, 2026). It backs the ratings with 67,299 net domestic migrants and the nation's most residential building permits (Census Bureau, 2025-2026)." }, { "rank": 2, "name": "North Carolina", "detail": "CNBC 2025: No. 1, third win in four years", "score": "95.1", "blurb": "CNBC's top state for business in 2025, its third win in four years, on workforce and economic strength (CNBC, 2025). One of only two states with significant job growth in the year through May 2026, up 61,800 jobs (BLS, 2026)." }, { "rank": 3, "name": "Florida", "detail": "CNBC 2025: No. 3 | No income tax", "score": "93.8", "blurb": "Third on CNBC's 2025 list (CNBC, 2025) and structurally strong with the Tax Foundation as one of nine no-income-tax states (Tax Foundation, 2026). Tied for the fastest state GDP growth of 2025 at 3.1 percent (BEA, 2026)." }, { "rank": 4, "name": "Tennessee", "detail": "CNBC 2025: No. 8 | Tax Foundation 2026: No. 8", "score": "92.9", "blurb": "The consistency champion: eighth with CNBC and eighth with the Tax Foundation, the latter up from 38th in 2020 after eliminating its investment income tax (CNBC, 2025; Tax Foundation, 2026)." }, { "rank": 5, "name": "Ohio", "detail": "CNBC 2025: No. 5 | New flat tax", "score": "91.4", "blurb": "Fifth on CNBC's 2025 rankings (CNBC, 2025), and in 2026 it became the 14th state to adopt a flat individual income tax, a structural move the Tax Foundation's index rewards (Tax Foundation, 2026)." }, { "rank": 6, "name": "Georgia", "detail": "CNBC 2025: No. 7 | Flat 5.19 percent tax", "score": "90.6", "blurb": "Seventh with CNBC in 2025, powered by logistics and workforce (CNBC, 2025), with a flat income tax of 5.19 percent on a legislated downward path (Tax Foundation, 2026)." }, { "rank": 7, "name": "Indiana", "detail": "CNBC 2025: No. 9 | Rate cut in 2026", "score": "89.5", "blurb": "Ninth on CNBC's 2025 list (CNBC, 2025) and one of eight states that cut individual income tax rates on January 1, 2026 (Tax Foundation, 2026 State Tax Changes). A long-standing top-10 structural performer." }, { "rank": 8, "name": "Virginia", "detail": "CNBC 2025: No. 4, then a federal shock", "score": "88.2", "blurb": "Fourth on CNBC's 2025 rankings, published before the scale of federal downsizing was clear (CNBC, 2025). BLS data now shows Virginia as the only state with a significant 12-month job loss, down 52,200 (BLS, May 2026). The rating and the reality are diverging." }, { "rank": 9, "name": "Michigan", "detail": "CNBC 2025: No. 6", "score": "87.4", "blurb": "Sixth on CNBC's 2025 Top States for Business, its best showing in years, on infrastructure and cost competitiveness (CNBC, 2025)." }, { "rank": 10, "name": "South Dakota", "detail": "Tax Foundation 2026: No. 2", "score": "86.8", "blurb": "Second-best tax structure in America, with no individual or corporate income tax (Tax Foundation, 2026). CNBC ranks it mid-pack on workforce depth, the classic small-state trade-off (CNBC, 2025)." }, { "rank": 11, "name": "Wyoming", "detail": "Tax Foundation 2026: No. 1", "score": "86.1", "blurb": "The best-structured tax code in the nation for the 2026 index: no corporate or individual income tax, a competitive 4 percent sales tax, and no estate or inheritance tax (Tax Foundation, 2026). CNBC scores its tiny labor pool much lower (CNBC, 2025)." }, { "rank": 12, "name": "Minnesota", "detail": "CNBC 2025: No. 10", "score": "84.9", "blurb": "Tenth with CNBC on education, health, and quality-of-life metrics (CNBC, 2025), despite a tax code the Tax Foundation has long graded near the bottom third (Tax Foundation, 2026). The two raters disagree about Minnesota more than almost any state." }, { "rank": 13, "name": "Colorado", "detail": "CNBC 2025: No. 11", "score": "84.0", "blurb": "Just outside CNBC's 2025 top ten at No. 11 (CNBC, 2025), with a flat income tax the Tax Foundation credits structurally. Census data shows it newly losing domestic migrants, a warning light (Census Bureau, Vintage 2025)." }, { "rank": 14, "name": "New Hampshire", "detail": "Tax Foundation 2026: rising, no income or sales tax", "score": "83.3", "blurb": "Improved three places on the Tax Foundation's 2026 index after completing the repeal of its interest and dividends tax, leaving it with neither an income tax nor a sales tax (Tax Foundation, 2026)." }, { "rank": 15, "name": "Massachusetts", "detail": "CNBC 2025: No. 20, Most Improved", "score": "82.1", "blurb": "CNBC's Most Improved State of 2025, climbing 18 spots to No. 20 on innovation and workforce strength (CNBC, 2025). The Tax Foundation grades its tax structure far less kindly, especially the millionaire surtax (Tax Foundation, 2026)." }, { "rank": 41, "name": "Connecticut", "detail": "High costs on both scorecards", "score": "45.3", "blurb": "Long graded near the bottom of the Tax Foundation's index for stacked income, property, and estate taxes (Tax Foundation, 2026), with unemployment of 5.1 percent in May 2026, among the nation's highest (BLS, 2026)." }, { "rank": 42, "name": "Washington", "detail": "Tax Foundation 2026: No. 45 | CNBC 2025: No. 14", "score": "44.1", "blurb": "The sharpest split decision in America: CNBC ranks Washington 14th on economy and innovation, while the Tax Foundation ranks its tax structure 45th, citing the business and occupation gross receipts tax and recent tax increases (CNBC, 2025; Tax Foundation, 2026)." }, { "rank": 43, "name": "Montana", "detail": "CNBC 2025: No. 48 | Tax Foundation 2026: No. 6", "score": "42.7", "blurb": "The reverse split: the Tax Foundation ranks Montana's tax structure sixth best, while CNBC ranks the state 48th overall with the worst workforce score in the nation (Tax Foundation, 2026; CNBC, 2025). Good tax design cannot conjure workers." }, { "rank": 44, "name": "Vermont", "detail": "CNBC 2025: No. 47", "score": "41.4", "blurb": "47th on CNBC's 2025 rankings, weighed down by cost of doing business and a small, aging labor pool (CNBC, 2025)." }, { "rank": 45, "name": "Rhode Island", "detail": "CNBC 2025: No. 46", "score": "40.6", "blurb": "46th with CNBC, which scores it the fifth-most-expensive state to do business in and 46th for business friendliness (CNBC, 2025)." }, { "rank": 46, "name": "California", "detail": "Bottom tier of the Tax Foundation index", "score": "38.9", "blurb": "The Tax Foundation places California's tax structure near the bottom of its 2026 index, and the state carried a 5.3 percent unemployment rate in May 2026, highest of any state (Tax Foundation, 2026; BLS, 2026). Scale and venture capital keep it from ranking lower." }, { "rank": 47, "name": "New Jersey", "detail": "Tax Foundation 2026: No. 49 | CNBC 2025: No. 30", "score": "37.2", "blurb": "Second-worst tax structure in the nation: the highest-rate corporate income tax, among the highest property and individual income taxes, plus an inheritance tax (Tax Foundation, 2026). CNBC is kinder at No. 30 on workforce and location (CNBC, 2025; NJBIA, 2025)." }, { "rank": 48, "name": "New York", "detail": "Tax Foundation 2026: No. 50", "score": "35.8", "blurb": "The worst-structured tax system in America for the 2026 index, cited for high individual and corporate rates and heavy combined sales taxes (Tax Foundation, 2026). It still posted the second-fastest GDP growth of 2025, proof that ratings and output are different questions (BEA, 2026)." }, { "rank": 49, "name": "Hawaii", "detail": "CNBC 2025: No. 49", "score": "34.1", "blurb": "CNBC scores Hawaii 49th with the highest cost of doing business in America and the second-highest cost of living (CNBC, 2025). Distance and housing costs do the rest." }, { "rank": 50, "name": "Alaska", "detail": "CNBC 2025: No. 50", "score": "32.5", "blurb": "CNBC's worst state for business in 2025, last in the Economy category as North Slope crude fell about 12 percent in a year (CNBC, 2025). The Tax Foundation, judging tax structure alone, has long scored Alaska near the top, the widest disagreement on the board (Tax Foundation, 2026)." } ], "narrative": [ { "heading": "Two rulers, deliberately different", "html": "This report synthesizes two named raters and attributes every judgment. CNBC's America's Top States for Business 2025 measured all 50 states on 135 metrics in 10 categories, its largest methodology ever, and crowned North Carolina for the third time in four years, followed by Texas, Florida, Virginia, and Ohio. The bottom five, in order from 46th: Rhode Island, Vermont, Montana, Hawaii, and Alaska (CNBC, July 2025).
The Tax Foundation's 2026 State Tax Competitiveness Index asks a narrower question: how well is the tax code built? Wyoming ranked first, South Dakota second. New York ranked last at 50, with New Jersey 49th (Tax Foundation, October 2025).
Where both rulers point the same way, the conclusion is strong. Texas, Florida, and Tennessee score in the top tier of both systems. Tennessee is the cleanest case in the country: eighth with CNBC, eighth with the Tax Foundation. No other state matches its rank on both boards.
" }, { "heading": "The split decisions tell you more than the agreements", "html": "Four states expose exactly what each rater measures. Washington ranks 14th with CNBC on the strength of its tech economy, and 45th with the Tax Foundation, which faults its business and occupation gross receipts tax and recent tax increases (CNBC, 2025; Tax Foundation, 2026). Montana is the mirror image: sixth-best tax structure in the nation, 48th with CNBC, which scores its workforce dead last (Tax Foundation, 2026; CNBC, 2025).
Alaska is the widest gap on the board. CNBC ranked it the worst state for business in America in 2025, last in the Economy category, as oil prices sagged. The Tax Foundation has long scored Alaska's tax structure among the nation's best. Both are measuring honestly. One measures the code; the other measures the consequences of depending on one commodity.
Minnesota completes the set: 10th with CNBC on education and quality of life, bottom third with the Tax Foundation on tax design. A reader who sees only one scorecard for any of these four states is being told half a story.
" }, { "heading": "Does the federal data back the raters?", "html": "Ratings are opinions with methodologies. Federal data is the check. It mostly confirms the top: North Carolina, CNBC's No. 1, was one of only two states with statistically significant job growth in the year through May 2026, up 61,800 jobs, and led the nation in net domestic migration at 84,064 (BLS, 2026; Census Bureau, Vintage 2025). Texas and Florida pair top-3 CNBC ranks with the second-most migrants and the fastest 2025 GDP growth, respectively (Census Bureau; BEA, 2026).
The check also catches the raters aging badly. CNBC ranked Virginia fourth in July 2025. By May 2026, Virginia was the only state in America with a significant 12-month job loss, down 52,200 jobs as federal downsizing hit (BLS, 2026). And New York, ranked dead last by the Tax Foundation, grew real GDP 2.9 percent in 2025, second fastest in the nation (BEA, 2026). A bad tax structure and a strong year can coexist. The record shows both, so this report does too.
" }, { "heading": "The structural direction is one-way", "html": "Whatever weight a reader gives each rater, the policy direction underneath them is not ambiguous. Ohio became the 14th flat-tax state in 2026. Eight states cut individual income tax rates on January 1, 2026: Indiana, Kentucky, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, North Carolina, Ohio, and Oklahoma. New Hampshire finished abolishing its last income tax and climbed three places on the index (Tax Foundation, 2026).
Movement at the top of the CNBC table tracks the same geography: the 2025 top ten contains six Southern and Midwestern states, and the top three are all Sun Belt. The framework here pays no attention to which party produced any of it. It reports what the raters scored and what the federal data shows. If the pattern produces discomfort, the discomfort belongs to the reader, not the data.
" } ], "settled": "Beyond argument: North Carolina was CNBC's top state for business in 2025, its third win in four years, and Wyoming holds the best-structured tax code in the Tax Foundation's 2026 index while New York holds the worst. Texas, Florida, and Tennessee rank in the top tier of both scorecards, and the federal jobs and migration data point the same direction for all three. Alaska ranked last with CNBC in 2025, driven by oil dependence.", "contested": "How much any of this is causal remains contested. Critics of CNBC note its category weights shift yearly, making year-over-year moves partly methodological. Critics of the Tax Foundation note its index measures tax design, not tax levels or outcomes, which is how bottom-ranked New York posted the nation's second-fastest 2025 GDP growth. Whether business climate rankings predict investment or merely describe places already winning is an open empirical question that neither rater's methodology resolves.", "charts": [ { "type": "bar", "title": "CNBC America's Top States for Business 2025, top 10 (1 = best)", "unit": "overall rank", "data": [ { "label": "North Carolina", "value": 1 }, { "label": "Texas", "value": 2 }, { "label": "Florida", "value": 3 }, { "label": "Virginia", "value": 4 }, { "label": "Ohio", "value": 5 }, { "label": "Michigan", "value": 6 }, { "label": "Georgia", "value": 7 }, { "label": "Tennessee", "value": 8 }, { "label": "Indiana", "value": 9 }, { "label": "Minnesota", "value": 10 } ] }, { "type": "bar", "title": "Tax Foundation 2026 State Tax Competitiveness Index, selected ranks (1 = best)", "unit": "index rank", "data": [ { "label": "Wyoming", "value": 1 }, { "label": "South Dakota", "value": 2 }, { "label": "Montana", "value": 6 }, { "label": "Tennessee", "value": 8 }, { "label": "Washington", "value": 45 }, { "label": "New Jersey", "value": 49 }, { "label": "New York", "value": 50 } ] }, { "type": "bar", "title": "CNBC 2025 bottom five states (50 = worst)", "unit": "overall rank", "data": [ { "label": "Rhode Island", "value": 46 }, { "label": "Vermont", "value": 47 }, { "label": "Montana", "value": 48 }, { "label": "Hawaii", "value": 49 }, { "label": "Alaska", "value": 50 } ] } ], "sources": [ { "title": "CNBC, America's Top States for Business 2025: The full rankings", "url": "https://www.cnbc.com/2025/07/10/top-states-for-business-americas-2025-the-full-rankings.html" }, { "title": "CNBC, North Carolina is America's Top State for Business in 2025", "url": "https://www.cnbc.com/2025/07/10/north-carolina-top-state-for-business-america.html" }, { "title": "CNBC, Alaska is America's worst state for business in 2025", "url": "https://www.cnbc.com/2025/07/10/alaska-worst-state-for-business-america.html" }, { "title": "CNBC, How we are choosing America's Top States for Business in 2025 (methodology)", "url": "https://www.cnbc.com/2025/06/11/how-we-are-choosing-americas-top-states-for-business-in-2025.html" }, { "title": "Tax Foundation, 2026 State Tax Competitiveness Index, full study", "url": "https://taxfoundation.org/research/all/state/2026-state-tax-competitiveness-index/" }, { "title": "Tax Foundation, Movers and Shakers in the 2026 State Tax Competitiveness Index", "url": "https://taxfoundation.org/blog/best-state-tax-rankings-most-improved/" }, { "title": "Tax Foundation, 2026 State Tax Changes Taking Effect January 1st", "url": "https://taxfoundation.org/research/all/state/2026-state-tax-changes/" }, { "title": "U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, State Employment and Unemployment Summary, May 2026", "url": "https://www.bls.gov/news.release/laus.nr0.htm" }, { "title": "U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, GDP by State (2025 annual and Q1 2026)", "url": "https://www.bea.gov/data/gdp/gdp-state" }, { "title": "U.S. Census Bureau, Vintage 2025 State Population Estimates", "url": "https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-kits/2026/national-state-population-estimates.html" }, { "title": "NJBIA, NJ Ranks 30th in CNBC's America's Top States for Business in 2025", "url": "https://njbia.org/nj-ranks-30th-in-cnbcs-americas-top-states-for-business-in-2025/" } ], "faq": [ { "q": "What is the best state for business in 2026?", "a": "By synthesis of the major raters, Texas: No. 2 with CNBC in 2025 and structurally strong with the Tax Foundation as a no-income-tax state. CNBC's own No. 1 for 2025 was North Carolina, its third win in four years. CNBC's 2026 edition is due in July 2026." }, { "q": "Which state has the best tax code for business?", "a": "Wyoming, ranked first on the Tax Foundation's 2026 State Tax Competitiveness Index. It levies no corporate or individual income tax and no estate or inheritance tax. South Dakota ranks second." }, { "q": "Why do the rankings disagree about states like Washington and Montana?", "a": "They measure different things. CNBC scores 135 metrics on workforce, economy, and infrastructure; the Tax Foundation scores only tax structure. Washington is 14th with CNBC but 45th with the Tax Foundation; Montana is 6th with the Tax Foundation but 48th with CNBC." }, { "q": "What is the worst state for business?", "a": "CNBC ranked Alaska 50th in 2025, last in its Economy category amid falling oil prices. For tax structure specifically, the Tax Foundation ranks New York 50th, citing high individual and corporate rates." } ] }