US News and World Report Names OKC Best Place to Launch Second Career

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Oklahoma City, Okla.

Population: 563,196

Median home price: $121,500

Among U.S. metro areas with a population of at least 1 million, this state capital has the lowest business costs
, in part because of tax incentives, according to KPMG's 2010 "Competitive Alternatives" analysis of 112 cities in 10 countries. It also has an unemployment rate of just 5.6 percent. "People can find jobs here, period," crows Roy Williams, president and CEO of the Greater Oklahoma City Chamber of Commerce.

Energy companies
are big employers, and Tinker Air Force Base provides a steady stream of consulting work for retirees, particularly military folks. Plus, the University of Oklahoma Medical Center is spawning growth in healthcare jobs as well as bioscience start-ups.

Among workers in the country's 52 largest cities, Oklahoma City residents deal with the third-shortest commutes, according to the Census Bureau's most recent American Community Survey. Drivers spend an average of 21.35 minutes behind the wheel on their way to work, with only drivers in Rochester, N.Y., (20.37 minutes) and Buffalo-Niagara Falls (20.78) arriving quicker.

Joel Martin, 55, a retired Air Force colonel and now a senior staff fellow at the University of Oklahoma, moved from Denver with his wife Elizabeth, a book editor, six years ago after a 26-year military career in which he served as a meteorologist, hurricane hunter, and Air Force officer recruiter. Thanks to differences in the price of housing, fuel, and utilities, he says, "our estimates at the time were that the cost of living in the Oklahoma City area would be about 10 to 15 percent less than the Denver area. That has proven to be true, if not a bit conservative."

Martin's personal motivation was to return to his home state. "What I've found in OKC is not only a lower cost
of living, but an increasing sophistication in what the community offers in return. I'm an avid Apple fan and was encouraged to find a new Apple store—and plenty of Starbucks."