U.S. Development Metric and Recent Unemployment Rate

U.S.A. Economic Development

Update 12/21/2010: Just wanted to acknowledge the new US Census population data compared to the estimates used in the worksheets and analysis of this post. The estimate used in the analysis from wikipedia was 0.6% greater than the actual count in the 2010 Census. Because the actual population count is less than the estimate, the US measurement metric increased by 0.01 with similar small adjustments to State metric measures. The impact does not change the narrative assessment of the analysis.

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As an extension of previous data analysis of world development, I looked at a comparative assessment of United States economic development as well as some countries around the world using available data from wikipedia and the CIA Fact Book. Primarily, it began as an initiative to find some relative measure to compare activity and levels of development regarding political discussions of states competing for corporate investment. Multiple factors are considered for such activity depending on the objective of the corporation and theoretically, an educated, multi-skilled work force has higher earnings. 
A note of importance: The data is economic activity not individual earnings!

The basic calculation of the measure is the state % of US economic activity divided by the state % of US population [US Basis]. I have additional work on a world basis for the upcoming World Data Comparison II updated blog post. The Development Metric provides a quick comparative level assessment of US development (regions and states). Since the total United States activity is the basis of measurement its metric is 1.00 relative to the individual states, although not reflected for reasons that may be obvious to some. The Metric of 4.44 and 5.37 is the World Economy basis Development Metric.

Obvious economic impacts are (1) the petroleum industry in Texas and Alaska; (2) finance industry in the Northeast; and (3) the political and lobby spending in DC (not a state but included anyway).

Latin America GDP Analysis

Earlier blog discussions centered around economics and social designations relative to the united society creating the United States. Comparisons were made to primarily European countries and I wanted to complete the perspective by including Latin America. The data also provides a clear view of the immigration topic relative to our neighbors in the Americas south of US.

Slides: Latin America GDP Comparison [revised]

Related Topic Website:

Council on Foreign Relations - Latin America

Related Blog Posts:

Social Spending and GDP

Assets and Values

Explanation and Critique of Quadrant Labels