SmartAsset, a financial technology company based in New York, considered a number of factors to create its listing of the counties in Arkansas that have the most incoming investments, a listing released in May. Those factors were:
- The number of businesses established in each location over a three-year period;
- GDP growth, using inflation-adjusted figures, in the local economy;
- Real estate growth, calculating the number of new building permits per 1,000 homes, and
- Federal funding received by each county, examining federal funding in the form of contracts awarded to businesses in each county, which it then divided by the population.
SmartAsset then ranked every county in its study on these four factors, combining the scores to create a final ranking. With that ranking, it created an index in which the county with the most incoming investments was assigned a value of 100 and the county with the least investment activity received a zero.
Arkansas Counties With the Most Incoming Investments
| Rank | County | Business Growth | GDP Growth ($ in millions) | New Building Permits (per 1,000 homes) | Federal Funding (per capita) | Incoming Investment Index |
| 1 | Benton | 5.9% | $270 | 28.2 | $317 | 60.33 |
| 2 | Craighead | 0.6% | $115 | 23.0 | $27 | 49.53 |
| 3 | Washington | 5.6% | $241 | 16.5 | $629 | 45.93 |
| 4 | Lonoke | 1.5% | $48 | 10.4 | $210 | 34.91 |
| 5 | Saline | 3.0% | $87 | 7.8 | $113 | 33.05 |
| 6 | Faulkner | 3.4% | $117 | 6.5 | $31 | 31.78 |
| 7 | Greene | 0.6% | $36 | 8.0 | $1 | 31.24 |
| 8 | Pulaski | 0.4% | $564 | 7.2 | $200 | 30.57 |
| 9 | Pope | 4.7% | $75 | 4.1 | $37 | 29.89 |
| 10 | Lincoln | 9.0% | $8 | 0.0 | $10 | 28.41 |
| State of Arkansas | -1.9% | $40 | 2.6 | $107 |
Sources: SmartAsset, U.S. Census Bureau County Business Patterns Survey, U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, U.S. Census Bureau Building Permits Survey and USAspending.gov
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