People starting the new year looking for a job may not need to look far: WalletHub’s latest findings show that Columbia, Maryland ranks second in the nation on its “Best Cities for Jobs (2026)” list. This is an improvement over 2025, when the financial website ranked Columbia third in the nation.
“It’s important to look at more than just the number of jobs available or the unemployment rate when determining the best place to find employment,” said Chip Lupo, analyst at WalletHub, in a statement. “Quality matters just as much as quantity, from the average salaries and benefits to job security and overall satisfaction. There are plenty of secondary factors to take into account as well, from how easy a city makes commuting to jobs to whether it’s a good place for raising a family or engaging in recreational activities outside of work.”
The report names Scottsdale, Arizona as the top city for the second year in a row, and found that nationwide in 2025 unemployment stayed relatively low. In some places, worker shortages even gave job-seekers leverage when talking pay and benefits with would-be employers.
WalletHub analyzed 180 cities in the U.S. based on 31 factors shaping the strength of local job markets, including job openings per applicant, employment growth, and average starting salary each month.
Columbia is the second-best city for jobs, in part because it ranks first in median household incomes in the nation at nearly $129,000 (adjusted for the cost of living). The city came in fourth on net employment outlook, which measures the quarterly percentage of employers who plan to add employees minus the percentage who expect to lose them.
Affordable rent helps residents stretch their salaries further, too. The average annual fair market rent for a two-bedroom apartment in Columbia is only around 16% of the median household income. That is the fifth-lowest percentage in the country.
Another boost to Columbia’s ranking is protection against one of the biggest threats to future job security: automation and AI. Columbia jobs are relatively safe, with the ninth-lowest share of jobs likely to be automated in the coming decades.
Dr. Daraius Irani is vice president for business and public engagement and chief economist at the Regional Economic Studies Institute (RESI) at Towson University. He explained the types of jobs that are AI-proof that are not only safe but expected to grow.
“AI proof jobs-think trades, think physical services-nurses and other health professions and any job/occupation that requires a great deal of critical analysis,” Irani wrote. “Generative AI can create code, but it cannot debug code.”
The WalletHub study considered job market factors like employment growth, job opportunities, monthly starting salary, automation risk, job security, apprentice-trainee jobs, share of workers in poverty, disability-friendliness of employers, and more in the 31 facets it used to rank the cities. It also considered socio-economic factors, like median annual income, average work and commute time, transit accessibility, housing affordability, family-friendliness, and more.
