Gov. Tina Kotek gave Oregon’s business competitiveness a “B” during a Sept. 24 gubernatorial business forum in Portland. But the numbers tracked by Oregon Business & Industry show a state much closer to the bottom of the national rankings.
The Oregon Scorecard, maintained by Oregon Business & Industry, puts Oregon at No. 42 overall in CNBC’s 2026 America’s Top States for Business ranking. That is a three-place drop from last year and Oregon’s lowest position in the 20-year history of the CNBC ranking.
The picture gets tougher in several categories businesses feel directly.
Oregon ranks 43rd for business friendliness and 43rd for cost of doing business. Its tax competitiveness ranking sits at 35th, while its corporate tax ranking is 49th. Infrastructure is a brighter spot, with Oregon ranking 17th.
The decline has also been sharp over time. Oregon ranked 17th overall in 2017. Nine years later, it sits 42nd and, for the first time, among the bottom 10 states in CNBC’s overall ranking.
For Oregon businesses, the rankings matter because they track conditions tied to where companies invest, expand and hire, including operating costs, taxes, infrastructure and the broader regulatory environment. The rankings do not determine whether an individual business will succeed, and Oregon Business & Industry itself notes that no single index tells the whole story.
Kotek has also acknowledged that Oregon has work to do.
“Are we where we want to be? Of course not. Are we getting better? Yes,” Kotek told business leaders at the forum.
Her administration has set an ambitious benchmark. Kotek’s Prosperity Roadmap, released in December 2025, called for moving Oregon from what was then 39th in CNBC’s overall ranking into the top 10 states for business. Oregon has since fallen three more places.
For Salem-area employers and entrepreneurs, that leaves a clear measure to watch: whether Oregon can reverse its decline in the national rankings while the state pursues permitting, tax and economic-development changes intended to improve its competitiveness.