Measuring ‘economic adversity’ poses challenges

The World

An index of Economic Adversity from Moody’s Economy.com and msnbc.com has taken the economic pulse of 381 cities across the US. The good news: only one city is still spiraling further into recession. The bad news: as economic recovery moves slowly forward, understanding each community’s singular struggles proves a complex task.

Las Vegas has been battered by the perfect storm of falling tourism and a crashing housing market. Ian Mylchreest, executive producer with State of Nevada on KNPR, reports on a city in crisis.

Oklahoma, on the other hand, is a state where at least two cities ? Oklahoma City and Lawton ? are in a state of recovery. But what does recovery mean after such a profound economic crash? Like Las Vegas, Oklahoma has its own unique set of problems. With an economy based on oil and natural gas, the state projected massive earnings ? and then fell short by a billion dollars in 2009, throwing the state budget into a tailspin. Gail Banzet, reporter for KOSU in Oklahoma, joins us with more.

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