According to a new study by MarketWatch, San Francisco is the second best city In California for business. The survey included only cities with populations greater than 500,000. San Francisco is the 31st best place in the nation for business (Washington, D.C. is first). The only California city to fare better in the study was San Jose, which came in 25th nationally. However, the study was not all positive for California. Five inland California cities made up the bottom 10 of the list.

The study assesses a city’s business clout according to 15 categories aimed at measuring both business strength and economic output.

How Can San Francisco Become Number One?

Since San Francisco doesn’t like to think of itself as second best in anything (much less 25th best), city leaders are looking at innovativeness to give our city a competitive advantage in the marketplace.
As they look to make sure San Francisco is number one, they should think about how keeping this edge means investing in basic intellectual infrastructure like great public schools and affordable colleges and universities. Great ideas like an online library of free college textbooks is just one small way to keep education affordable.

San Francisco rightly claims to be the capitol of the world’s digital economy. But staying number one means we need to keep investing in our future — including closing the city’s digital divide. High-speed Internet is a strong civic return on investment as it has shown it brings new business.

And ultimately, becoming number one means preserving smart programs like GoSolarSF, which has attracted a multitude of new solar companies to the city and creating more innovative programs like ChinaSF, which helps drive job growth through increased trade.

Number one in job growth means we can afford to be number one in all those other areas that matter — from great schools to a cleaner environment. Since it all starts with jobs — making sure government stays focused on the great Gov 2.0 innovations that promote a stronger economy should be a job our Reset community embraces.