Be INFORMED

Sunday, April 03, 2011

North Dakota: Best State To Live In…

   ….and that isn’t a joke.

  North Dakota’s  Economics/Fiscal Policy are to be admired.

Unemployment rate: 3.8%

Statewide GDP: 3.9%  ranked 3rd in the United States in 2009, as 2010 stats are not available at this time.

Job Growth: Businesses in North Dakota  had the best hiring to firing ratio of all the 50 states in 2010 according to a Gallup survey.

Stable housing market. Across the nation, nearly 1 in 4 homeowners with a mortgage are underwater. In North Dakota, just 1 in 14 have negative equity, the fourth lowest negative-equity ratio among all the states. The state also has the third-lowest home foreclosure rate. Affordable homes are a big part of the story here; let's just say you don't need to overstretch to own. According to Zillow, the median home price in North Dakota is below $150,000. That's less than three times the state's median household income. By comparison, even after sharp post-bubble price declines, the median priced home in California is still about five times median household income.

Violent Crime: 4th lowest in the United States and almost 60% lower than national average according to 2008 stats which are the latest available.    Source

Add that all up and you have the makings for a pretty contended bunch. In fact, Gallup recently concluded that North Dakota is the third happiest state in the U.S., trailing only Hawaii and Wyoming. (The saddest state? West Virginia.)

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[Happiest U.S. Cities to Work]

Saturday, April 02, 2011

Saturday Satire: Political Cartoons

  These are some of the best political cartoons of the week according to PoliticalHumor. I’m off to clean up the mess on my boat that the nice storms created the other day.

Copyright © 2011 Creators Syndicate

Copyright © 2011 Creators Syndicate

Copyright © 2011 Universal Press Syndicate

Copyright © 2011 Creators Syndicate

Copyright © 2011 Universal Press Syndicate