Nevada: A jobs magnet 

By Greg Kaza

For the third time in the 21st century, Nevada had topped the U.S. in jobs creation in an economic expansion.

Nevada’s nonfarm payroll employment growth rate has expanded 41.2% versus the U.S. average (22.2%) since the last recession ended in April 2020, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) records show. The growth is through June 2025, the last month with non-preliminary national and state jobs data.

Nevada also leads all 50 states in percentage jobs growth in the period.

The nonpartisan National Bureau of Economic Research, founded in 1920 in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is widely recognized among economists as a business cycle arbiter. The NBER determined expansions also occurred earlier this century between November 2001 to December 2007, and June 2009 to February 2020.

Nevada’s job creation rate (24.5%) also topped the U.S. (5.5%) in both the 21st century’s first expansion and second (26.2% vs. 16.2%), BLS records show.

Many factors play a role in economic development. These include tax policy; a skilled work force, a product of the K-12 and post-secondary educational systems; infrastructure; rule of law, freedom of contract and private property rights; a non-arbitrary regulatory environment; medical insurance and quality-of-life amenities.

Nevada is one of nine states without a state income tax. By contrast, neighboring California has a top 13.3% individual rate, according to the Tax Foundation in Washington, D.C. 

Advantage: Nevada. California’s jobs rate (20.7%) has trailed the U.S. (22.2%) since the last recession ended in April 2020. 

Another potential factor is Nevada’s leadership rank as a tourist mecca, a position painstakingly built by private industry and public officials in the post-war era.

Nevada’s tourism leadership is also reflected in BLS jobs data, with Leisure and Hospitality as the state’s largest private employment sector, employing 367,000 in June. The Leisure and Hospitality jobs creation rate (111%) also tops the U.S. average (95%).

Some observers dispute the importance of tax rates. Would other states be cutting or eliminating income taxes if the issue weren’t important to industry and officials? Mississippi enacted a multi-year income tax phase-out with revenue triggers in March, emulating Tennessee, which eliminated the tax in 2021. Other states with income tax rate reductions effective Jan. 1, 2025, were Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, Missouri, Nebraska, New Mexico, North Carolina and West Virginia, according to the Tax Foundation.

Other observers argue Nevada’s growth is influenced by other factors including its Sunbelt location.  

But states with above-average jobs rates aren’t limited to the Sunbelt. Seven of the current top 10 jobs states aren’t in the Sunbelt. These are Michigan (33.4%), Rhode Island (28.5%), Idaho (27%), New York (26.9%), Vermont (26.2%), Pennsylvania (25.6%) and New Jersey (25%). Only Florida (28.9%) and South Carolina (27.8%) are Sunbelt states like Nevada (41.2%).

Policymakers should debate all factors, but one point is clear: Nevada’s status as a jobs magnet deserves national recognition.

Economist Greg Kaza is executive director of the Arkansas Policy Foundation, a Little Rock think tank founded in 1995.