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Journal Article
Are Water Resources Keeping Up with U.S. Economic Needs?
Access to water is necessary to sustain human civilization and agricultural production. Recent analysis finds that most of U.S. land area, economic activity, and agricultural production are in regions with stable to positive trends in local water availability. This provides reassuring news about overall U.S. vulnerability to water resource depletion. However, some Western and Southwestern regions are facing serious water risks that scientists expect to become more severe over time, suggesting that efforts to alleviate this concern should have a regional focus.
Journal Article
Measuring Labor Market Similarities in Nearby Regions
Labor market conditions are similar in regions that are near each other. This is called positive spatial correlation. Analyzing county-level data from 1990 to 2024 shows that commuting flows may contribute to strong spatial correlation in employment growth. Spatial correlation appears to have strengthened since the 1990s, at the same time as more workers were commuting across county lines. As these connections grow through commuting flows, both favorable and challenging conditions in local economies may become more likely to spread farther than in the past.