The accolades for the Triangle keep on coming. The most recent came out a week ago when the annual list of Best Places for Business and Careers by Forbes magazine ranked the Raleigh-Cary Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA), which encompasses Wake County along with Franklin and Johnston counties, in first place and the Durham MSA, which covers Durham, Orange, Chatham and Person counties, at seventh in the same list. (MSAs are the way the U.S. government divides communities in the census and other surveys, although most people in the Triangle do not split the areas the same way.)

Raleigh-Cary grabbed the top spot after three consecutive years as runner-up in the Forbes rankings. Durham also has done well in the previous surveys, although it should be noted that up until two years ago it and Raleigh-Cary were counted as one metro area in the listing.

In announcing Raleigh’s win, Forbes noted that the metro’s economy has expanded 6 percent annually over the past three years. Helping to fuel this growth are business costs that are 13 percent below the national average and a labor force where 38 percent of adults have a college degree – the 12^th-highest percentage in the country. Raleigh-Cary performed well also in low net migration (ranked 15^th in the country) and 35^th nationally in job growth, both measured over the most recent five-year period.

Durham outranked Raleigh-Cary with an even larger number of adults with a college degree – it finished sixth in that category. The cost of doing business in Durham is also a positive for the metro area, as it finished 33^rd nationally. Both Durham and Raleigh-Cary finished within the top 100 metros nationally in six out of the nine categories Forbes used in its listing.

For this year’s ranking, Forbes relied on economic research firm Economy.com, owned by Moody’s. Its business cost index factors in labor, tax, energy and office space costs. For living costs, Economy.com weighs housing, transportation, food and other household expenditures. It also supplied five-year historical figures on job and income growth, as well as migration trends.

Other data used in the rankings came courtesy of Portland, Ore., researcher Bertrand Sperling, who looked at the education of each metro’s work force as well as the presence of four-year colleges in each area. Sperling also examined such quality-of-life issues as crime rates and cultural and recreational opportunities.

Forbes also comes out with other lists annually in which the Triangle routinely finishes in the top 10 nationally, including the sixth-best city for singles and the sixth most wired metro area for the Internet, both in 2006. With the strong performance on this list, we expect the area to do well again when these lists come out later this year.