This summer was a slog, but at least there is one big bright spot: economic output. "We are in a recovery," said Howard Wial, who co-authored the report with Richard Shearer. "Economic output is still growing across the country, and it's spread to more cities. House prices are in general going up, too."

With every leading indicator is pointing up except in housing, I asked Wial about his projections for home prices. In most parts of the country, he said, home prices are steady. In some parts, they're still falling. But it's not always where you'd think. "In Las Vegas," where the real estate crash was severe, "the market overshot and prices are starting to pick up. In the northeast, however, homes are overpriced and we still expect prices to fall."

The Great Recession was born when the housing bubble ruptured. So it's inevitable that most of the 20 cities leading the US recovery cluster in the Great Plains, Texas, and smaller state capitals that missed the wave of higher home prices. Notably, there are no cities on the list from California, Florida, Arizona, or Nevada, where the bust was most violent. Instead of banking on real estate, many of these cities have diverse economies that combine local services, like insurance, with global producers trading their wares to other overseas companies.

Some of these cities will surprise you. "What's Buffalo doing on the list?" asked one Buffalo native in the office. And what about Jackson, Mississippi? Baton Rouge? These don't sound like the kind of dynamic metros we'd expect to power a recovery. But they've been relatively successful in the downturn because they've been stable.

All but two of Brookings' 20 "strongest cities" have average or below average cost-of-living, according to a Wall Street Journal story. At a time when Washington can't seem to get employers and employees together, employment has been sticky where wages and living have been cheap.