Innovation, which lies at the heart of economic growth, stems from a bunch of factors and Washington metro area continues to have a lot of those, housing three of America’s top ten most innovative places.
The latest edition of Wallet Hub rankings places the District as the third, Maryland the fourth and Virginia as the seventh most innovative place on its index.
The rating of the 50 states and the district takes into account some of the key enablers and the nation’s capital scores impressively on most of them.
The District has both the highest number of STEM (Science Technology and Mathematics) professionals and tech companies. The capital also has the highest share of science and technology graduates – ready to join the new pool of jobs that are expected to come with some of the largest data centers that Google and Microsoft are having in the region as well as the second Headquarters of Amazon – to be located in Crystal City.
And that is not all. In 2020, the District will have the highest number of STEM jobs.
![Photo By Lucas Cantor (Georgetown Day - 17) [CC BY 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons](https://www.viewsnews.net/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Georgetown_Day.jpg)
Photo by Lucas Cantor (Georgetown Day – 17) [CC BY 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons
D.C., for example, spends more than its share of per capita on research and development. Maryland has the faster Internet service. Virginia has incentivized cyber security research. Some of the biggest tech companies have their main offices in the area.
The area also attracts some of the best and the brightest students from the nation and the world. Coupled with local business and tax incentives, the environment makes the entire area a lucrative destination for investors.
Overall, Massachusetts and Washington state rank first and second in the country while California – home to Silicon Valley gets the 6th place on the index.
