America is home to extreme regional differences in economic opportunity. Some communities project success: two-parent families predominate, children attend good schools, residents enjoy good health, new businesses abound, and many adults have well-paying jobs. In other communities, there is a tragic reality of despair: unstable families, poorly performing schools, high rates of morbidity and substance abuse, and the absence of work and business creation are dishearteningly common. The Covid-19 pandemic has exacerbated many of these disparities. The chapters in this story help explain how America came to be a land of stark regional economic divides, use our lived experience to identify what makes regions resilient to hard times, and examine potential solutions to protracted regional economic distress.

Students who don’t attend college get zero in higher education spending. The longer you go to college, and the more that college spends, the more you receive. Students who attend prestigious colleges receive several hundred thousand dollars in resources over the course of four years. What’s more, much of it is not paid for by the families themselves, because most colleges spend more than they charge in tuition.