Last Call For The State Of The States

Business Insider has ranked all 50 states based on their 2013-2014 economies, using cold hard stats:

Previously, Business Insider examined ranked every state by how quickly the economies were growing. This time around, we calculated which states had the best economies outright.

We ranked each state on seven economic measures: the July unemployment rate; the change in non-farm payroll jobs from June to July 2014; the 2013 GDP per capita; the 2012 per capita consumption; the 2013 average annual wage; the 2013 exports per capita; and the 2012 government expenditures.

So which state is where?  The top 10 are actually surprising:

10) Wyoming
9) Vermont
8) Delaware
7) Connecticut
6) Massachusetts
5) Washington
4) Alaska
3) New York
2) Texas
1) North Dakota

Several blue states, but 3 of the top 4 are red states with energy industry booms.  Fracking has been really good for the bottom lines of several state budgets, not so good for the people who live there.  It put Wyoming the the top 10 and knocked California to 11.

Meanwhile the bottom 10 will surprise precisely nobody:

41) Hawaii
42) Idaho
43) Nevada
44) Kentucky
45) West Virginia
46) South Carolina
47) Maine
48) Arkansas
49) New Mexico
50) Mississippi

States with dwindling natural resources and little to no investment in infrastructure?  Check across the board.  Nevada has bet the state's economy on that Tesla gigafactory in an effort to get out of the basement, but the rest of this pack have several problems.Hawaii has the highest cost of living of any state, Kentucky and West Virginia's coal industries are dying, as is Maine's fishing.  Idaho, Arkanas and Mississippi have all made brutal education cuts and GOP Gov. Susana Martinez has run New Mexico's budget into the ground.

How long will North Dakota's boom last?

We'll see.