Let’s pretend that the 50 states decide at a close future time to dissolve the Union. No fighting as almost everyone agrees that there are irreconcilable differences between them. Let’s pretend that the US turns into a loosely allied federation, a la Commonwealth. They have a Nato-type defense deal, but each “country” has its own military.
Which states will do well, economically speaking? Will these come out better or worse after the dissolution?
Which states will do badly, and what will happen to them?
What would happen to Puerto Rico?
I know that this is a complicated scenario with many ifs, but mostly I would like to know which states are net contributors, and which are being “supported”, or propped up, if you will, by the current scheme.
Going by Gross State Product, California and Texas would be okay by there own GDP. While Vermont and North Dakota would be dirt poor countries.
European Union
United States of America
Japan
Germany
People's Republic of China (mainland only)
United Kingdom
France
Italy
California
Spain
Canada
Brazil
Russia
Texas
California could secede and be a player on the international scene all by themselves.
But your question has a ton of variables from food supply issues to catastrophe problems. Louisiana would have been like Bangladesh I guess if a hurricane hit it. While West Virginia having a lot of coal may make it a stable place, and Iowa with all it’s corn. Ah well fun to think about but I don’t think I can wrap my head around the whole picture.
As for who is being propped up most states have a large per capita federal funding, the newest I could find was from 1998 I am sure a more recent summary is somewhere.
I’d guess one of the first things to happen would be California or another large-population state annexing/invading Alaska. Alaska isn’t remotely self-sustaining, but has some resources a bigger state would probably appreciate having.
I’m not certain that this is even a viable scenario. Some states, like California or Ohio, could probably be agriculturally and economically self-sustainable; most states would need to form internal alliances or join completely. Hawai’i might just need to pimp itself out as a tax haven and free trade zone. Alaska might as well join with Canada. I’m not even sure what states like New Mexico, Louisiana, or Wyoming could bring to the table in terms of self-sustenance. Puerto Rico and other protectorates would be SOL. And with all states split, each would have to develop international relations with other nations, all vying for concessions and so forth. The United States would become like Eastern Europe or South Asia.
In short, this would be a bloody mess. The only winners would be states like California or Texas, who could maintain exports or technological leads, and even that is pretty questionable.
Oregon and Washington will band together, grow really good dope and be the vacation mecca for the rest of you guys. We’ll do just fine…
Seriously, though, we don’t have a lot of population to support but we are quite intensely agricultural (including ranching beef, sheep and chickens along with other meat critters,) we have some excellent ports we can charge people to use, we have aluminum and steel production and a fairly good level of fabrication, manufacturing and high technology expertise. A huge proportion of our electricity comes from hydroelectric plants and we aren’t likely to run out of rivers anytime soon. We also still have quite a few of those paper mills that we could retrofit to make paper out of all that leftover hemp fiber–and we could do the same for hemp fiber as cloth. We’ve made some good strides in biodiesel and could conceivably also put large tracts of our more inhospitable central high desert land into high oil crops like hemp, jojoba and some of the other non-tropical oil plants. I think we’d have a good chance of making it on our own.
We’d export our beer for extra cash and the rest of you would line up for it… Oh, and we’d charge through the nose to export our Cascade hops, too!
A Nato-type alliance (as specified in the OP) would prevent an invasion either by one of the other former states or a foreign invasion. An alliance/annexation could be possible, but remember that the reason stated is that the states themselves have decided they do not want to stay together.
So… what would happen to Alaska? West Virginia? Rhode Island? New York? Etc.
Well, couldn’t Alaska produce enough oil/blubber/baby seal coats to sell and buy food/booze/cigars/women/whatever-it-is-they-don’t-have?
The reason why I am curious is because I was recently discussing the divide between northern and southern Italy, and how Northern Italians seem as if they would be very happy if they could disengage themselves from the South and all its economic and social problems. I don’t know enough about Italy to know if that would be a good idea, but I have heard similar sentiments from some Americans living in wealthier states. Hence the above scenario.
New England, for instance, could perhaps survive on its own- but the individual states could not, I don’t believe. Too intertwined.
In my honest opinion, you would be better served to divide the existing fifty into the de facto city-states it is already constituted of- for instance, TX would divide into a region centered in Dallas-Ft. Worth, one centered on Amarillo, on on San Antonio, etc.
If there’s no fighting, what the heck do inland states completely surrounded by other states need a military for? Ok, so maybe their military is a mostly-token somewhat beefed up State Patrol or Guard units, but still…
And frankly, I don’t think the current state borders are viable, except within a federal union. The historical reasons they were set where they were are largely irrelvent now. I can’t find a cite but I once saw a very interesting map of the continental US which showed what the US would look like divided up onto about 30 regions based on current cultural and economic foundations.
Ok, let’s say California and Texas can go it alone. What about New York? I think the greater New York/Jersey area could probably stand as a Singapore-type city-state.
I think the blue states in the northeast would probably form into a union of sorts. There’s more agriculture than you probably realize there. We’d have very friendly relations with the west coast. We’d also be a financial mecca.
Actually, I don’t see any real reason why the whole thing should fall apart unless people start acting like jerks. Oh. :smack:
Technically that’s true of a hundred countries. At least fifty nations could not fend off the Canadian armed forces, much less what something like California would bring to bear. Russia could conquer more than half the countries in the world.
Why would Alaska, in particular, get invaded? Countries don’t generally do this sort of thing willy-nilly. Who’s going to be the aggressor here?
What is all this talk about smaller states not being viable independently? Lichtenstein seems to be doing okay, for crying out loud, but Wyoming couldn’t make it?
We have a lot of people here in the US who are very big on their own brand of religion, and seriously into owning guns. It’s not the greatest combination in the world for peace.
Yeah, but who the hell is W. Virginia going to invade on its own? Specially if no “big” former-state is going along with them.
ETA: So, some states lack something, can’t they just buy it from another state, just like everybody else? We don’t make cars here and we have entirely too many of them anyways. It’s called international commerce.
How many tax havens does the world really need? From the Wikipedia article:Despite its limited natural resources, Liechtenstein is one of the few countries in the world with more registered companies than citizens; it has developed into a prosperous, highly industrialized, free-enterprise economy, and boasts a financial service sector as well as a living standard which compares favourably to those of the urban areas of Liechtenstein’s large European neighbours. Relatively low business taxes—the maximum tax rate is 18%—as well as easy Rules of Incorporation have induced about 73,700 holding (or so-called ‘letter box’) companies to establish nominal offices in Liechtenstein. Such processes provide about 30% of Liechtenstein’s state revenue. Liechtenstein also generates revenue from the establishment of stiftungs (“foundations”), which are financial entities created to increase the privacy of nonresident foreigners’ financial holdings. The foundation is registered in the name of a Liechtensteiner, often a lawyer.
Liechtenstein doesn’t even maintain its own diplomatic relations or mint and print its own currency, and its government is smaller than the PTA board of a large school. For all practical purposes it is a small semi-independent protectorate of Switzerland. Next you’ll be bringing up the Principality of Monaco and the Most Serene Republic of San Marino as examples of successful independent nations.
We’re good, so the rest of y’all can go to Hell for all we care!
Arizona and Nevada would quickly join California. Nevada has a little leverage, being up-river a bit. But without California’s agriculture, Vegas turns into desert very quickly.
Alaska will revert a bit, but they’ll still trade with the Outside. Russia lacks the capability to invade that big a land mass so far from anything remotely populous in Russia. Just getting across Siberia would be a stretch. Just because Mooselini can see Russia doesn’t make them a viable threat.
Oh, and we’d charge through the nose to export our Cascade hops, too!