Where You Should (and Shouldn't) Move to Start Your Career

If you're looking to start a career, where you live has a big impact on your chances for success. As reported by Forbes, the personal finance website WalletHub recently looked at data for America's 150 biggest cities to determine the best and worst places for budding professionals to move after graduating with the class of 2016.

They looked at a list of criteria for each city—including median starting salary, housing prices, annual job growth rate, ratio of entry-level jobs to residents, and the percentage of people with bachelor's degrees—in order to gauge its professional opportunities and quality of life. Based on their analysis, Salt Lake City, Utah, came out on top. The city tied for first with Atlanta, Cincinnati, and Orlando for most entry-level jobs per 100,000 working-age residents. Denver, Austin, Sioux Falls, and Minneapolis were named the next four best cities for college graduates to relocate to. 

WalletHub also named the worst places to move in their findings. Detroit occupied the bottom spot with Fresno and Moreno Valley, California, placing only slightly higher. Below them Akron, Hialeah, and North Las Vegas received some of the worst overall scores.

As for the best cities for young professionals, only one—Denver—is an especially popular choice among recent graduates, according to a recent study from the student loan marketplace Credible. Other cities with high ratios of out-of-state graduates, like New York City and San Francisco, are notorious for being some of the most expensive places to live in the country. If you're looking for an entry level job in a city where you can survive on an entry level salary, WalletHub's list is a good place to start.