25 Richest Cities in America

Boulder is the wealthiest metropolitan area in Colorado and the 10th wealthiest nationwide. Most households in the metro area earn over $80,000 a year, and 13.7% of households earn at least $200,000 a year — a larger share than in all but six other metro areas nationwide.

Like many metro areas on this list, Boulder is home to a well-educated labor force and a favorable job market. Nearly two-thirds of adults in Boulder have a bachelor’s degree or higher compared to less than a third of American adults, and the city’s unemployment rate of 2.5% is well below the national unemployment rate of 3.8%. Major employers in the metro area include high-paying tech companies like Google and IBM.

Urban Honolulu is the wealthiest metropolitan area in Hawaii and the ninth wealthiest nationwide. Most metro area households earn at least $81,000 a year, and more than one in every 10 households earn at least $200,000 a year. The area’s high incomes are reflected in the high property values. The typical home in the Honolulu area is worth $680,200, more than triple the value of the typical American home of $217,600.

Incomes are boosted by a healthy job market. Just 2.7% of area workers are unemployed, over a full percentage point below the 3.8% national unemployment rate — which itself is near a historic low.

California-Lexington Park, Maryland, is located at the end of a small peninsula between the Potomac River and the Chesapeake Bay, south of Washington D.C. It is the wealthiest metro area in the wealthiest state. The typical metro area household earns $81,495 a year, and the typical Maryland household earns $80,776, each well above the national median household income of $60,336. The area also lacks the kind of financial hardship that is much more common in the rest of the country. Only 3.2% of area households earn less than $10,000 a year, less than half the 6.5% comparable national share.

Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue is the wealthiest metro area on the West Coast outside of California. Most households in the metro area earn at least $82,000 a year, and 12% of households earn at least $200,000 annually. The metro area is home to a well-educated workforce — nearly 42% of metro area adults have a bachelor’s degree or higher — and to a number of high-paying companies. The largest employers in the Seattle metro area include Amazon, Boeing, and Microsoft.

Oxnard-Thousand Oaks-Ventura is a metro area of about 850,000 just north of Los Angeles. The typical household in the area makes nearly $83,000 a year, $22,500 more than the typical American household. Most homes in the metro area are worth over half a million dollars, making the area prohibitively expensive many lower-income Americans. Just 3.1% of households in the metro area earn less than $10,000 a year compared to 6.5% of households nationwide.