let's get now to special correspondent scott cohn who is live once again in the mystery state. > brian, we started "top states" nine years ago in 2007. at the tail end of the real estate bubble. we followed state competitiveness through the great recession, the slow recovery and as a result there have been a lot of changes over the years but also some constants. with that in mind let's look now at state number three. utah. the beehive state. buzzes in at number three this year with 1,556 points. utah was also number three last year. utah's best category, its economy. the bast overall in the nation according to our study with strong job growth among the most solid state finances in the nation and a thriving consumer economy. unemployment is among the lowest in the country. utah's worst category -- education. a perennial weak spot here with large class sizes and low spending. but utah showed strong improvement in the category over last year. utah's individual income tax is 5%. the corporate franchise tax is 5%. the state sales tax is 4.7%. with local taxes pushing the total as hig

meantime, scott cohn giving final clues on this year's top state for business, scott?milked this as long as we possibly can. so the time has finally arrived. we're going to take one more break, and when we come back america's top state for business 2015. you'll want to watch it. standby. business by leading the way on tax cuts. we cut the rates on personal income taxes. we enacted the lowest corporate tax rate since 1968. we eliminated the income tax on manufacturers altogether. with startup-ny, qualified businesses that start, expand or relocate to new york state pay no taxes for 10 years. all to grow our economy and create jobs. see how new york can give your business the opportunity to grow at ny.gov/business >>> the guessing began yesterday if not well before. the clues were heard all day today and the teases continued. let that final drum roll begin. for the 2015 best state for business. we go to the man with the answer. scott cohn. scott, we are begging you, please tell us where are you? >> our top state study. our exclusive top state study literally goes through

scott cohn joins us in the next block to take a look at which states have the best workers. >> i'm scottn america's top state for business minnesota. in a moment we're going to look at one of our key categories. our study lets us take the states through their ups and downs. allow me to illustrate. >> announcer: and now the latest from tradingnation.cnbc.com and a word from our sponsor. the e-class has 11 intelligent driver-assist systems. it recognizes pedestrians and alerts you. warns you about incoming cross-traffic. cameras and radar detect dangers you don't. and it can even stop by itself. so in this crash test, one thing's missing: a crash. the 2016 e-class from mercedes-benz. you total your brand new car. nobody's hurt,but there will still be pain. it comes when your insurance company says they'll only pay three-quarters of what it takes to replace it. what are you supposed to do, drive three-quarters of a car? now if you had a liberty mutual new car replacement, you'd get your whole car back. i guess they don't want you driving around on three wheels. smart. new car replacement is

scott cohn is still there and taking a deeper dive. >> we are at the minnesota sea life aquarium in theess. if you are going to have top states, there are some states floating on the bottom. our annual look at america's bottom states for business coming up. >>> yesterday scott cohn told us the best state for business minnesota but there is a flip side to this and scott joins us from minnesota with the worst state this time scott? >> hi kelly. behind me you can see some of the fifth-ranked economy in the nation here in america's top state for business. we're at the mall of america in the middle of a $250 million expansion, so forget what you heard about the death of the shopping mall apparently but yes, if there are top states there are bottom states. here is the 2015 america's bottom states for business. louisiana comes in 46th this year a big drop from 40th last year. the state budget is a mess and doesn't help that falling oil prices have fouled the state's economy. that's a bigger problem in state 47 alaska. not only is the economy near the bottom, but the state is also among the wor

scott cohn has a look at some of the subsidies and the some say the whole thing has gotten out of handaluminum giant alcoa was looking to save money in new york state in 2007 it turned to the state's power authority and scored big. $5.6 billion in electricity discounts over 30 years. the largest single state business subsidy in u.s. history. the governor at the time elliott spitzer took credit for saving hundreds of jobs. not only is spitzer long gone so are some of the jobs and with alcoa talking about more cuts governor andrew cuomo agreed to sweeten the deal. >> good jobs first says it's a prime example of throwing good money after bad. >> they were devoted for companies that were there a long time ago and they just w to use a lot of cheap electricity. the alcoa deal helps put new york at the top of good job, first list of top subsidies and followed by washington state that has given massive tax breaks to boeing. in all, states are giving away $70 billion a year. >> that amount of money could have plugged significant state deficits during the recession. it could be keeping classroom

anyway, that is our scott cohn.ack this morning, a close call for some divers off of jupiter, florida. we have the video and the details right after the break. plus need a place to store your high-end car? want to show it off and do some racing? there's a new project that is breaking ground today. find out where you can get your very own car condo. that's coming up next. the e-class has 11 intelligent driver-assist systems. it recognizes pedestrians and alerts you. warns you about incoming cross-traffic. cameras and radar detect dangers you don't. and it can even stop by itself. so in this crash test, one thing's missing: a crash. the 2016 e-class from mercedes-benz. you probably know xerox as the company that's all about printing. but did you know we also support hospitals using electronic health records for more than 30 million patients? or that our software helps over 20 million smartphone users remotely configure e-mail every month? or how about processing nearly $5 billion in electronic toll payments a year? in

scott cohn is live in bloomington, minnesota breaking down all the winners and losers. i have to admit, i didn't expect it quite early either. >> but you got it after a little while. >> pretty good clues. >> my hints were diabolical enough apparently. there was one guy on twitter who got it actually on tuesday. but he had a little bit of an advantage because he's from the town where we were so he recognized the background. but he was the first one at least as far as i could see. interesting this year, you know we said this all along that we were looking more closely at workforce as opposed to cost of doing business which drove the study in the past. the states were pushing workforce more as businesses look for qualifiedy edied workers. first let's recap the top phi as you heard and see. here i am at the mall of america. minnesota is the top state for business. it was sixth last year. texas and utah repeated number two and number three. colorado moved up from number eight to number four this year making its first appearance in the top five since 2007. and georgia which w

also want to bring your attention to one item from silicon valley that our own scott cohn is reporting in the ellen pau gender discrimination case against venture capital firm kleiner perkins has tentatively ordered the former junior partner at kleiner perkins to pay more than $275,000 in court costs to her former employer after she lost that case in march. now, the ruling, which disallows some of the costs kleiner perkins already sought, is subject to final approval following a hearing tomorrow morning. ellen pao is we want to say here appealing that verdict and had challenged kleiner's cost claims as excessive. but the california superior court judge harold kahn largely disagreed. a new development in the ellen pao case. >> a double whammy for her. thank you very much with the breaking news there, dominic chu. this morning billionaire investor ron baron joined "squawk box" with some of his top stock picks. one man in particular is very popular on our desk. baron thinks the company's ceo has perfectly positioned the stock to go much higher. take a listen. >> this guy has a monopoly. t

scott cohn joins us to give us a first look at what's to come and maybe a little hint for us scott cohntate for business. and if you know anything about this study that we've now done for nine years, you know that we drag this out as long as we possibly can. so the countdown isn't actually going to begin now, but we're going to tell you a bit about how this study works. it is actually really serious stuff. basically the idea is we want to rate the states based on their own standards. so we go through every state's marketing materials. we see what they're using as selling points. and that's how we weight these ten categories of competitiveness. this is how the study breaks down this year. it's the year of the worker. companies are going where the skills are. >> the assurances we got was to invest here we'll definitely have the workforce for you. >> so workforce is the top category in top states this year. we also measure the cost of doing business. we look at infrastructure, the strength and the prospects for the economy. we measure quality of life technology, and innovation education, b

what it takes to clinch that number one spot and to give us a clue about this year's winner cnbc's scott cohnl. this is very interesting this year. in all seriousness, we've been doing this for nine years now through booms and busts. recessions and recoveries. and this year as we said the dynamic is changing to workforce. that's going to play an important role. i think that the choice is going to be very interesting. it's going to make some people not so happy, other people happy. so we'll see. here's one more clue about the state that we will reveal right on this program tomorrow. it is part blue part red. part blue part red. the countdown all day tomorrow on cnbc. we want to hear from you with the hashtag top states and our special website topstates.cnbc.com. >> jon fortt thinks he knows. >> missouri. split during the civil war. you said a long journey begins here. that's lewis & clark. >> i think it's illinois. a long journey begins here. route 66. began in chicago area in illinois. made its way to california. you're looking to lewis & clark, i'm looking to route 66. >> part blue, part red

scott cohn you've been crunching those numbers as part of your an mull america's top states for businessot everyone is happy about it right? >> they are not happy had a we're crunching subsidy numbers actually. this is the ninth year. >> ninth year. >> congratulations. >> thanks. >> it's coming up. $4.1 billion spread over three companies for elon musk might sound like a lot, but you know what? it's a pittance compared to some of the biggest deals. take a look at the granddaddy of them all. $8.7 billion to washington state in 2013 to keep -- from washington state to boeing i should say in 2013 tax relief to keep operations there. that's on top of 3 billion to give boeing years earlier. alcoa was given $5.6 billion in electricity discounts over 30 years back in twfn in exchange for a promise to protect 900 jobs but when the company made noises about cost-cutting and layoffs the state sweetened the pot with more electricity credits. elon musk more than $1.25 billion last year to build a battery plant in nevada. it apparently includes a unique feature where tesla gets to capture not only th