ND must have the best economy in the U.S (Fargo: sales, crime)

[Roloff1976]

yah...guess North Dakota is doing pretty good.

Grand Forks Herald | Grand Forks, North Dakota

[thrillobyte]

How do you survive the brutal winters??

[tijlover]

It's totally arbitrary who you ask that question. Ask the same question of someone living in Phoenix, how they survive the brutal summers? And you'll get a similar answer. Lots of time spent indoors. Pedestrian-deserted
sidewalks. And listening to your neighbors say, summer after summer: This is my l-a-s-t, l--a--s--t, very last summer I spend here. And you wait until next year and the following years to hear the same refrain, over and over again.

I spent 43 years in Minnesota, and I sort of miss hearing those refrains every March or April. And then seeing those same faces the next year and the following years. The vast majority are still there! And so are my friends back in Phoenix!

[leroyleroux]

Originally Posted by parrotheadmomma

Oh ok, yes that makes sense. You have to bear with me. I'm from the East Coast and although I lived in a rural area for a while, I've never heard anyone say that. Maybe it's the same as what old timers here would call the "ole home place". Where the family started out and all of the family would congregate for different occasions.

Sorry, didn't mean to come off as condescending. Your wiki post makes sense too. As I understand it, people just came out here, put up a house and a certain amount of property was theirs.
Ach...there was a movie about that, but I can't remember what it was. People were racing across the midwest to get the best properties.

[Jay F]

Originally Posted by Roloff1976

yah...guess North Dakota is doing pretty good.

Grand Forks Herald | Grand Forks, North Dakota

The largest GDP increase of any state, now I am convinced more than ever that North Dakota has the best economy.

[Reziac]

Originally Posted by parrotheadmomma

JJBradley you are spot on!

Also what does homesteaded mean! Somebody said they were homesteaded in MN and I'm sorry but I don't know what that means LOL.

[blink] Is ND bringing back the Homestead Act??

Methinks this would be a good thing, as it would encourage people to resurrect farms that are presently going to waste. The one industry we as a nation need above all others, if we are to remain a free country (not a debtor vassal to some other country) is FARMING.

My great-granddad homesteaded in ND back around 1900, near Hansboro. My grandmother lost the farm somewhere around WW2 because she was widowed, raising 5 kids by herself, and couldn't pay the taxes on it.

[Reziac]

Here's a good example of why ND's economy is good and why the state budget is balanced:

East Grand Forks awards flooding clean-up contract to Zavoral & Sons | Grand Forks Herald | Grand Forks, North Dakota

Note that the cleanup contracts were awarded at $117,280 for East Grand Forks and at $72,000 for Grand Forks.

The exact same work in most states would have resulted in contracts being awarded in the multiple MILLIONS of dollars. Much smaller "floods" in Los Angeles (there meaning an affair of a few days duration, affecting only a single neighbourhood) have had cleanup budgets in excess of $5 MILLION dollars.

Why? Waste, graft, contracts awarded to political buddies; and the fact that for every dollar paid to a worker, another dollar or more must be paid into Workman's Comp, payroll taxes, and the like.

[Roloff1976]

Unfortunately, Homesteading would not be able to take place in North Dakota anymore. The farms that are sitting idle, still belong to people or owned by families. The land is still being tilled and planted, or in CRP with the families being paid to let them sit idle by the Feds. People just don't want to let the farmsteads go (even though many are in disrepair). So you can't homestead land that is already owned by other people.

[Reziac]

Originally Posted by Roloff1976

Unfortunately, Homesteading would not be able to take place in North Dakota anymore. The farms that are sitting idle, still belong to people or owned by families. The land is still being tilled and planted, or in CRP with the families being paid to let them sit idle by the Feds. People just don't want to let the farmsteads go (even though many are in disrepair). So you can't homestead land that is already owned by other people.

True, but a LOT of those old farms went back to the state for taxes during the Depression, and I know positively as late as the 1980s some were still owned by the state -- dunno how much has since been sold off to the public.

My own ancestors' farm was one of those that wasn't sold off by the state until about 25 years ago -- I didn't find out until too late.

The problem with selling it outright is that right now the most interested parties are going to be real estate speculators, who certainly don't do the economy any good in the long run. Letting family farmers homestead the land and earn its ownership that way would be a lot more productive to ND's future. And that would give us a new generation of farmers, which otherwise will not happen -- it's just too damned expensive to get into farming anymore, unless you start with corporate backing.

[Jay F]

The Wall Street Journal has an article about the booming ND economy.

online.wsj.com/article/SB124415780405186905.html