rich US States and poor US states

[Hugh Lawson]

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/11/science/rich-states-poor-states-personal-income-disparity.html?ref=science

The difference in per capita income among US states had declined
dramatically since 1930.

HL

[Hugh Lawson]

Here's a tiny-url:

http://tinyurl.com/mj92h7k

In 1930, the per-capita income of the richest state Connecticut was 5.1
times the pci of the poorest state South Carolina.

In 2012, the richest state was still Connecticut, but its pci was not
even twice that of the poorest state, now Mississippi.

Observed at the level of per capita income by state, the US is much less
diverse than it was eighty years ago. There is probably a cultural lag
in the awareness of this fact.

Gavin Wright explained why decades ago: the old cotton economy
disappeared. Cotton is still grown in the South, but not many persons
work in cotton growing. There just aren't any sharecroppers any more.
There are still some tenant farmers, but they are nothing like the
hard-up folk depicted in _Now Let Us Praise Famous Men_. Instead they
are cotton growers with machinery who grow some of their cotton on land
they rent.

HL