Our Hometown Resilience scores include
each state’s vulnerability to federal budget cuts.

Thinking about where you, or your children, should call home in coming years? Consider where Congress will cut back support for job markets and local economies. States' resilience to federal expense cuts varies.

(Yes, I know the budget deficit has come way down, but it’s hard to see Congress loosening the pursestrings anytime soon.)

In South Dakota, federal grants subject to ‘sequester’ comprise over 10% of the state’s revenue. In Delaware, they’re under 5%.

In Maryland, Virginia and DC, almost one worker in 25 has a non-defense job with the federal government. In Connecticut, it’s only one in 250.

Impacts from big non-defense expense seem to me all-but certain in every state in the country. Both parties are committed to major cuts over the next ten years, and if spending isn’t ‘sequestered’ today, it will be heavily pruned over the coming years.

With so many jobs and state services heading for attrition, it pays to know where the cutbacks could hurt the least. The Pew Center on the States has gauged these vulnerabilities state-by-state, and Climate-Proof has incorporated them into our free Where-To-Live Scorecards.