Houston metro economy fifth largest in U.S.

Houston Business Journal

The Houston-Sugar Land-Baytown metropolitan area’s economy grew at 1.6 percent last year, according to figures released Tuesday.

The U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis reported that the gross metropolitan product in Houston was $384.6 billion, up 1.6 percent from 2009, and ranked the metro area fifth largest in the nation. The GMP is the total output of goods and services in a given area during a given year — a small-scale version of the nation’s gross domestic product. The national average GMP was 2.5 percent.

On Numbers, a database feature of American City Business Journals American City Business Journals Latest from The Business Journals DFW is 6th nationally in gross metropolitan productSouthlake top DFW city among nation's most affluent2011 40-under-40 winners announced Follow this company , looked at the 366 metropolitan areas tracked by the bureau.

Leading the metro areas was New York, where the economy grew 4.6 percent to $1.3 trillion. It was followed by Los Angeles with a GMP of $735 billion, Chicago at $532.3 billion and Washington, D.C., with $425.2 billion in GMP.

Dallas was just behind Houston with a GMP of $374 billion