The Worst-Off Places

Based on our proprietary stress index and the ongoing parade of bank failures, we are coming to the conclusion that the worst off states in the USA are (insert drum-roll, please) Arizona and Nevada. Both of these States are in the top ten of bank-failures-to-population, and losses-to-assets; additionally, unreleased data from our stress index shows that both States have moved into the top ten of stressed states. Further evidence includes the above-national-average unemployment rate in Nevada and house foreclosure rates in both states.

We suggest the acuteness of distress in these two states is a telling commentary on the nature of the present Depression. This Depression is not just about economics, but habitability itself - that is, the very appropriateness of a place for human habitation.

These two, desert states are the quintessence of artifice. They are full of cities that have no business being there and only exist because developers wanted to make a fast buck. Now the easy credit bubble which drove the process of unsustainable colonisation has popped, these states are entering a tailspin faster and harder than the rest of the Union. We posit that the drying-up-and-blowing-away process will be much shorter and more catastrophic than the aforementioned colonisation.

Generally speaking, people appear to have forgotten that Arizona and Nevada are predominantly deserts; indeed, they seem sublimely convinced that those states are somehow permanently sustainable. This can easily be contrasted with, say, Michigan, another severely distressed state, which has an enviable natural endowment - the Great Lakes, ample rainfall, fertile farmland, vast forests.

Simply put, however bleak the future might be, Michigan's population has one. The same can not be said for Arizona and Nevada. As the Federal highway, water, and electric systems upon which these two states are utterly dependent decline, the capacity of these two states to support human population will diminish and the dream of the Desert Paradise in the American Southwest will expire.

We suggest, as part of Depression preparedness, our readers ask themselves how habitable is it where they live? How would you get around without cars and highways? Where is the nearest source of fresh water? of electrical power? In the deserts, how would you manage without air conditioning? In colder climes, what if it cost four times as much to heat your house during winter?

What answers you might derive, dear Reader, informs whether or not any given area will be able to support people. This includes both basic foodways, as well as the economic systems necessary to facilitate their interaction in the larger economy. We feel the national (and global) economy will not have sufficient 'fat,' if you will, to support places which, in the end, contribute nothing of any value or importance.