Carefree’s the smartest small town in Arizona according to data from On Numbers rankings nationwide. Small towns are those with 1,000 to 9,999 residents.

And Paradise Valley is the brainiest of the mid-sized cities in Arizona. The population of those cities are between 10,000 and 49,999 residents.

On Numbers rated local brainpower by using raw 2009 data from the U.S. Census Bureau’s five-year American Community Survey. Each place’s score was based on its percentage of adults (25 or older) at each level of a five-rung educational ladder:

AND, Scottsdale and Tempe are the smartest big cities in Arizona. The East Valley is the place to be for the smartest big city folk in Arizona, based on a population of a city of at least 100,000 people. It’s followed, in order, by Tempe, Gilbert and Chandler.

Another interesting statistic is that only 38% of Arizonans were born in the state. When I moved here 33 years ago, the joke was finding someone who was a native.  But, we’ve surely had an influx of people from all over during that time looking to enjoy our sun and amenities since then!

Arizona was the No. 2 state for relocations from California, with 47,164 people moving here last year from the Golden State. A majority of people who moved during 2010 reported housing related issues (44.9 percent) as their reason for relocating. Family related (27.9 percent) and employment related (18.5 percent) were reasons the others cited in the U.S. Census Bureau report.

Stats from Phoenix Business Journal, November, 2011