State economies ranked
From Bob Pitcher, State Law Newsletter Governing magazine has come out with a ranking of the economies of the 50 states as they are today, on such factors as a state’s unemployment rate, the change in that rate over the last year, the state’s gross domestic product and the changes in that figure, and so…
From Bob Pitcher, State Law Newsletter
Governing magazine has come out with a ranking of the economies of the 50 states as they are today, on such factors as a state’s unemployment rate, the change in that rate over the last year, the state’s gross domestic product and the changes in that figure, and so forth.
The results are interesting, and seem – to us, at least – to indicate how strongly cycles in regional economies, especially how a region is recovering from the Great Recession, affect states within those regions. The top five state economies currently were found to be Massachusetts, Oregon, Delaware, Colorado, and California, and the bottom five West Virginia, Alaska, Wyoming, New Mexico, and Louisiana.
The troubles of energy-related industries seem to account for the bottom five here. Governing did a similar study three years ago, but finds that only a few states have remained in either the top or the bottom quintile. Oregon and Utah were in the top ten in both 2013 and 2016 and New Mexico, Louisiana, and Connecticut in the bottom ten.
The study can be found online at Governing.com.