Austin is among the most educated cities in the U.S.

• The most educated cities, Forbes says, produce more innovation and tax revenue, which attract companies and ultimately lead to higher concentrations of educated residents.

Details: Forbes analyzed high school dropout and college graduation rates, undergraduate and advanced degree attainment rates, and the racial and gender inequities in degree completion rates to rank the nation's 100 most educated cities.

By the numbers: Nearly 60% of Austin residents hold a bachelor's degree, and more than 20% have a graduate degree.

• 13% of residents have some college experience without a degree.
• About 7% of residents dropped out of high school.
• Austin's educational attainment gender gap is less than 1% — among the lowest in the 100 cities examined.

Between the lines: Pointing to all manner of inequalities in booming Austin, the gap is 12% between white residents who earn degrees (72%) compared to all other races (60%), per the Forbes analysis.

• The Forbes analysis doesn't include a further racial breakdown of degree achievement.
• But older studies show a wide disparity, based on income and race, of degree completion among Central Texans.

Of note: Arlington, Virginia, came on top as the nation's most educated city.

At stake: A Central Texas student six years out of high school with no post-secondary degree has only a 12% chance of a living-wage job, per Austin nonprofit E3 Alliance, whose mission is to use data to change education.

What they're saying: "We're a highly educated community, but a lot of that brainpower and educational credentials are imported, from New York and California or wherever, with people wanting to come here because the economy is booming or they want to be part of the tech sector," E3 Alliance director Susan Dawson tells Axios.

• "We're not doing a good enough job of preparing our own student population to take those high-wage jobs in engineering or accounting," she said.