Technology is changing our lives for the better — improving our quality of life and enabling better ways to learn, work and play. And the United States’ technology industry is an economic engine, supporting more than 18 million American jobs — including almost two million jobs created between 2000 and 2018 — and accounting for 12% of U.S. GDP.
I challenge you, as a state policymaker, to find a single business that can run without the innovative products and services that American technology has founded.
We believe that collaborating with business on rulemaking to govern emerging technologies makes America the best country in the world for innovation. The CTA U.S. Innovation Scorecard emphasizes forward-thinking, light-handed policies that are proven to work and help today’s innovators create a better tomorrow.
In this fifth edition of CTA’s U.S. Innovation Scorecard, 15 states earned our highest rank — Innovation Champion — including five first-time Champions. Another 10 states climbed in overall rank, while only seven declined.
Since our last Scorecard in 2018, internet access has improved in all 50 states and self-driving vehicle testing and development have taken off. We also added criteria for how well states welcome 5G connectivity, e-scooters as a transportation option and apprenticeship programs that help build our workforce of the future.
Click through to see how well your state supports innovation. And we of course welcome your feedback, which you may provide at scorecard@cta.tech.
Gary Shapiro
President and CEO, CTA
These 15 states educate their populations in critical scientific and engineering fields, maintain friendly tax policies and give innovators freedom from burdensome rules.
CTA’s Innovation Scorecard is formulated using 12 complementary factors that, in combination, indicate how strongly a state supports innovation. Some of these factors relate to individuals in a state, while others address corporations doing business or employing people there, and others concern the legislative and regulatory environments. All third-party sources and state policy inputs reflect the newest information available as of December 31, 2019.
The overall Innovation Scorecard grade captures a state’s overall support for innovation based on the criteria above. Each criterion receives equal weight in the final scoring formula. Final composite scores are then graded on a curve to determine which of the four tiers a state will be ranked in — Modest Innovator, Innovation Adopter, Innovation Leader or Innovation Champion.