Meridian, located just outside of Idaho’s capital city of Boise, is 24//7 Wall St.’s best city to live in. The city is safe, and jobs have attracted growing numbers of new residents. Only 80 violent crimes were reported per 100,000 in Meridian last year, a fraction of the national violent crime rate of 366 violent crimes per 100,000 Americans.

The annual unemployment rate in the city is also quite low. At just 4.1%, it is lower than the state’s jobless rate of 4.8% and well below the national jobless rate of 6.2%. Moreover, jobs are being added to the local economy faster than in most of the United States. The 7.4% increase in the number of jobs from 2012 through last year was much greater than the national job growth rate of 1.8% over that period. Prospective employment is frequently the first priority for Americans considering relocation. With the strong job market, Meridian’s population has been growing dramatically in recent years. Over the five years through 2014, the city’s population growth rate of 28.0% was more than four times the nationwide population growth of 6.5%.