The good news? There's a place in the U.S. where the economy doesn't suck.

[KamaAina]

The bad news? It's North Dakota.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/06/us/06dakota.html?partner=rss&emc=rss&pagewanted=all

FARGO, N.D. — As the rest of the nation sinks into a 12th grim month of recession, this state, at least up until now, has been quietly reveling in a picture so different that it might well be on another planet....

State officials and private companies have begun looking elsewhere to recruit workers, including traveling in October to Michigan, where tens of thousands of workers have been laid off, and, this month, holding an "online job fair," anything to lure people to a place that is, at least for now, removed from the deep financial dismay — if also just plain removed.

"Our problem is that everybody thinks that it's a cold, miserable place to live," said Bob Stenehjem, a Republican and the State Senate's majority leader. “They're wrong, of course. But North Dakota is a pretty well-kept secret.".

Let's see about that, shall we, Bob? The current temperature in Fargo is 19 degrees, with snow on the way. All week. :scared. As for the miserable part, "a Republican and the State Senate's majority leader" pretty much sums it up.

[amdezurik]

1. the northern tier in winter is always cold

so that is not a shock, but living in that area is not as bad as you might think :)

[dmallind]

2. You can always put more clothes on

I'll take 19 (or even -19 which ND certainly hits) over 99 any day of the week. There's only so much you can take off (especially if you look like me!).

I've lived in cold places many times - from Mpls to Buffalo - and never had a problem being comfortable.

But other than maybe three cities, the lack of any kind of variety in entertainment and food availability in ND would work against my moving there. Same for the rural areas of most states (which is almost all of ND).

[BrklynLiberal]

3. That is exactly what I would say...except I have never lived in Mpls.

I would move to Alaska before I would move to Florida. My only problem in AK would be the darkness in the Winter. I could very easily live in the constant daylight of Summer.
I have been thinking about Wash State or Oregon, perhaps even British Columbia.

[eilen]

4. They did a story on our local news

that our real estate market is one of the healthiest -- or something to that idea. We don't have many foreclosures and our property values have held. Of course that is mostly because here in the upstate NY rust belt we are pretty immune to economic booms and have had a slow bleed of jobs and people since the mid 1970's. Our property taxes are relatively high compared to the rest of the country and our home values never went up very far to begin with. I think my 1500 sq. ft. 3BR, 1.5 Bath split colonial would probably assess for about $127,000 give or take $2,000. We purchased it for $82,000 in 1998.

But jobs? Meh.