I copied this from the urbanophile
http://www.urbanophile.com/
They write great anlysis of midwest cities, but usually don't cover smaller cities the size of Peoria. Note his comment abuut Peoria, which I am pleased to highlight. And I have invited the editor to visit Peoria, and he indicates that he will.
Best Performing Cities
The Milken Institute released their rankings of the best performing cities of 2009. Their index “ranks U.S. metropolitan areas by how well they are creating and sustaining jobs and economic growth. The components include job, wage and salary and technology growth.”
Austin, Texas was #1 in America. Here is how the large Midwest metros stacked up. On this one, a higher rank is better, like a normal league table. The ranking is out of the 200 largest metro areas. You know your region is struggling when it can’t crack the top 50. (In fairness, Peoria, a city I generally don’t cover, was #33)
* #52 – Kansas City
* #108 – Columbus
* #109 – Pittsburgh
* #123 – Minneapolis-St. Paul
* #125 – Indianapolis
* #128 – St. Louis
* #138 – Cincinnati
* #148 – Chicago
* #151 – Milwaukee
* #153 – Louisville
* #186 – Cleveland
* #199 – Detroit