ECONOMIC VITALITY

Economic Vitality measures the quantity and quality of jobs within a region, the relative incomes that its residents earn, the wealth they attain, and the economic opportunities seized by its entrepreneurs.

Tampa Bay is clearly a region on the rise and demand for space has accelerated prices for real estate. Tampa Bay ranks first in Existing Home Sales Price Growth Rate with an increase of 26%. Nationally, this increase was 11%. While in previous years, the Partnership tracked upward momentum in this indicator as a positive, this unprecedented rate of acceleration is exacerbating a housing crisis as local wages have not kept pace. Tampa Bay has an average wage of $57,427 and ranks 18th among comparison communities. Seattle, by comparison, has an average wage of $103,110, and saw home sales price grow 10%.

Tampa Bay ranks 5th in Business Establishment Start Rate, creating new companies at a rate of 11.50%, trailing just behind the leader, South Florida, at 12.74%. We also continue to have strong year-over-year performance in Advanced Gross Regional Product Growth Rate. We currently sit at 16% and rank 4th. Austin is the top performer at 28.04%.

Infrastructure

Infrastructure measures the quantity and quality of the investment a region makes in getting people here, getting them around, and keeping them safe while they are on the move.

Air passenger tra ic is back in a big way, showing tremendous improvement from –52.06% between 2019-2020 to 82.22% between 2020-2021. However, our ranking fell from 4th to 9th against comparison communities. On the roads, Tampa Bay drivers improved their commute times by an average of 1.3 minutes, but other communities are making better strides in commute times and our ranking fell from 11th to 13th.

Tampa Bay continues to see an opportunity to improve transit service – ranking near the bottom for both transit supply and demand. Pedestrian and cyclist safety continues to be a concern with the region’s fatality rate per 100,000 residents ranking 19th at 4.38, more than quadruple that of the top performer Minneapolis-St. Paul with a fatality rate of 0.81.

All four Florida-based MSAs track near the bottom for this safety metric, including holding the bottom three ranks, which points to a need for additional infrastructure investment.

There were no updates to Pavement Condition Good or Fair, or Annual Hours Lost to Congestion source data. The information provided is from the 2022 edition of the Regional Competitiveness Report.

Please also be aware that the 2022 findings for Pavement Condition Good or Fair indicator shown here reference 2020 data, the latest available data at the time of publication.