Utah Is the Best Place in America to Get Ahead. That’s Not an Accident — and It’s Not Guaranteed
In November 2025, Cities Strong Foundation brought Dr. Raj Chetty to Utah
Dr. Chetty is the Harvard economist who has spent his career mapping opportunities across America — tracking, zip code by zip code, which children rise and which ones don’t. His research is rigorous and his conclusions are, depending on where you sit, either encouraging or sobering.
For Utah, they are both.
His data confirms what many of us have long believed: Utah leads the nation in upward mobility. A child born into poverty here has a better chance of climbing into the middle class than almost anywhere else in America. That is a remarkable thing. It is something to be proud of.
But Dr. Chetty was direct about the challenge ahead. “Our children face greater inequality and complexity than previous generations,” he told the room, “with their futures increasingly dependent on the neighborhoods, schools, and relationships that surround them.”
Not income alone. Neighborhoods. Schools. Relationships.
Governor Spencer Cox, who joined us for the conversation, put the stakes in plain terms. We didn’t build what Utah has, he said. We inherited it — from leaders who built strong foundations, who invested in communities, who took seriously their responsibility to the people around them. “Now it’s our turn.”
That inheritance is real. And so are the cracks in it.
Within the same county, life expectancy varies by more than ten years depending on your zip code. Earning disparities persist across generations in neighborhoods just miles apart. The social fabric that made Utah’s mobility possible — the informal networks, the civic institutions, the culture of showing up for neighbors — is being stretched by rapid growth, rising costs, and the arrival of families who don’t yet have roots here.
Utah’s ranking isn’t a law of nature. It’s the result of choices. And it will be sustained, or lost, by the choices we make now.
That’s why Cities Strong Foundation exists.
We work across seventeen zip codes and seven cities on the Wasatch Front, connecting schools, nonprofits, faith communities, and local leaders so that the infrastructure of opportunity stays intact — and reaches the families who need it most.
In 2024 alone, our network delivered more than 200,000 hours of service through 19,000 volunteers, completed 671 neighborhood projects, supported nearly 7,000 students, and helped 110 families stay in their homes.
Not because we did it alone. Because the community did it together.
That’s always been Utah’s secret. And it’s still, if we choose it, our future.