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Would California really do well? It has a huge economy but it also has huge debt problems.
My main concern for them would be resources, water and energy. The State of Washington already sells energy to California. Then NV, AZ, and NM, would need to worry about water, most likely causing them to spend more money pushing them further and further in debt.
How so? Not arguing against you but just want to know why you think it's not close?
He has no idea why, he just knew one of the answers was north east, so he voted for it. He's the biggest north east homer/California hater cd.com has, and will ever have.
Texas is easily the most sustainable state on its own with energy, agriculture, technology, industry, creative energy of the people, no entitlement dependency. It would seem California has all of these but they have the highest unemployment and a huge class of people who think like the French (57% economy is Govt). I also think Washington state is pretty sustainable with agriculture, good wine, technology, and creative population and not an entitlement class.
Energy: wind (offshore/ on mountains) and hydro are available as well as natural gas most oil would need to be imported though but a lot of countries do this. Nuclear and solar also options. Coal is becoming to expensive especially in New England so most power plants are being converted to natural gas.
Trade/ Economy: several large ports and airports. Financial center of the world with Wall Street, Biotech capitol of the world Boston and #2 Philly, high tech industry everywhere in the region especially around cities but really spread throughout especially in New England. Plenty of agriculture dairy, beef, poultry from northern New York/ New England. Grains, corn, dairy, beef, etc. Pennsylvania. Maple syrup. Plenty of clean water available to drink and worse case scenario desalination is an option.
Quality of Life: very subjective but overall very good and offers many different types of living from super urban to very rural. COL is high but wages are also higher and some areas have a lower COL than others.
Politics: UN Headquarters is in NYC, many important/ influential politicians. overall very liberal or democrat, especially in New England part of the region
X-factor: the UN, education ie some of the best schools in the world, financial capitol of the world, biotech capitol of the world, produces about 25% of the United States GDP
-population: about 55,000,000 -area: 181,323 square miles
Midwest i see is being very underrated in this topic. We have most of the fresh water via great lakes, Agriculture, auto industry, Oil/energy/nat gas ( see Dakotas )etc. With Chicago leading the way ( could be the capital ) it is very doable.
Texas is easily the most sustainable state on its own with energy, agriculture, technology, industry, creative energy of the people, no entitlement dependency. It would seem California has all of these but they have the highest unemployment and a huge class of people who think like the French (57% economy is Govt). I also think Washington state is pretty sustainable with agriculture, good wine, technology, and creative population and not an entitlement class.
Washington state is one of the most sustainable place in North America especially for it's size! most people here probably don't realize that!
Location: where you sip the tea of the breasts of the spinsters of Utica
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I'd say California. What few things we don't have we can trade for, especially with that huge surplus of agricultural products. Water would be one of the few resources we might come to lack.
We would continue to have the highest GDP, and would continue to attract high tech businesses from around the world, due to infrastructure.
Everything would be similar to how it is now, except for the lack of federal govt. Trade would be about the same. I can't even imagine what the consequences of no federal govt would be, other than perhaps vulnerability to military attacks, and much less in the way of welfare.
Given the fact that there are many small European countries that have high standards of living I think most US states or regions would be ok as independent countries. The ones that are net tax contributors to the federal budget would probably do the best.
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