The Talent Dividend, an initiative out of CEOs for Cities, calculates how even a 1% increase in a city's population of college graduates results in great economic boosts. In Pittsburgh it's $1.8 billion. In regional Northeast Ohio, it's 2.8 billion.

The more educated the city, the more robust its economy, reports Joe Cortwright, author of the study. The percentage of college graduates in a city's population accounts for 58% of a city's economic success, as measured by per capita income. From Austin to D.C., the most successful cities have the highest number of college grads.

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