Much of the USA might be having problems but these folks in Fargo have got low unemployment, a booming housing market, & banks that did not give out a bunch of subprime ARM loans & they are not looking for bailouts.
http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/12/...ness/fargo.php
An economic downturn? Not yet for North Dakota
By Monica Davey
Published: December 7, 2008
FARGO, North Dakota: As the rest of the United States sinks into a 12th grim month of recession, this state, at least up until now, has been quietly reveling in a picture so different that it might well be on another planet.
The number of new cars sold statewide was 27 percent higher this year than last, state records through November showed. North Dakota's foreclosure rate was minuscule in the second quarter of this year, among the lowest in the country. Many homes have still been gaining modestly in value and, here in Fargo, construction workers can be found on any given day hammering away on a new condominium complex in the city center, complete with a $540,000 penthouse (still unsold, but with a steady stream of lookers).
While dozens of states, including neighboring ones, have desperately begun raising fees, firing workers, shuttering tourist attractions and even abolishing holiday displays to overcome gaping deficits, lawmakers this week in Bismarck, the state capital, were contemplating what to do with a $1.2 billion budget surplus. And as some states' unemployment rates stretched perilously close to the double digits in the autumn, North Dakota's was 3.4 percent, among the lowest in the country.
"We feel like we have been living in a bubble," said Justin Theel, part owner of a dealership that sells Toyotas, Dodges and Scions in Bismarck. "We see the national news every day. We know things are tough. But around here, our people have gone to their jobs every day knowing that they're going to get a paycheck and that they'll go back the next day."
North Dakota's cheery circumstance - which economic analysts are quick to warn is showing clear signs that it, too, may be in jeopardy - can be explained by an odd collection of circumstances: a recent rise in oil production that catapulted the state to fifth-largest producer in the nation; a mostly strong year for farmers (agriculture is the state's biggest business); and a conservative, steady, never-fancy culture that has nurtured fewer sudden booms of wealth like those seen elsewhere ("Our banks don't do those goofy loans," Theel said); and also fewer tumultuous slumps.
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As it happens, one of the state's biggest worries right now is precisely the reverse of most other states: North Dakota has about 13,000 unfilled jobs and is struggling to find people to take them.
"We could use more people with skills for some of these jobs," Marty Aas, who leads the Fargo branch of the state's Job Service North Dakota, said on a recent afternoon, as his offices - where the unemployed might come for help - sat quiet and nearly empty. State employees outnumbered approximately six clients on a recent afternoon. (Aas insisted that such a slow afternoon was rare.)
State officials and private companies have begun looking elsewhere to recruit workers, including traveling in October to Michigan, where tens of thousands of workers have been laid off and, this month, holding an "online job fair," anything to lure people to a place that is, at least for now, removed from the deep financial dismay - if also just plain removed.
"Our problem is that everybody thinks that it's a cold, miserable place to live," said Bob Stenehjem, a Republican and the majority leader of the state Senate. "They're wrong, of course. But North Dakota is a pretty well-kept secret."
With 635,867 residents, North Dakota is among the least populous states in the country and, in the past few years, more people have moved away, census figures show, than have moved there.
Katie Hasbargen, a spokeswoman for Microsoft's Fargo campus, which is in the middle of a $70 million or so building expansion and is, even now, looking for a few additions to its work force (of more than 1,500 people), said false perceptions of the state were the problem when it came to recruiting workers.
"The movie," she said, referring to the 1996 film that bears this city's name, "didn't do us a lot of favors."
On a recent evening, as the night shift arrived at DMI Industries, where 383 workers (an all-time high) weld gigantic towers for wind turbines and where a $20 million expansion is under way, Phillip Christiansen, the general manager, wandered the plant, noting those who had been recruited from elsewhere - three from Michigan not long ago, another from Louisiana. "It's very competitive around here trying to find people," Christiansen said. "In this environment, it's a little hard."
Not that people are complaining much. Downtown, in the line of gift shops along Broadway, where shop owners reported sales that were healthy, residents said they were pleased - if a tad guilty - about the state's relative good fortune.
No one was gloating. No wild spending sprees were apparent. No matter how well things seemed to be going, many said, they were girding, in well-practiced Midwestern style, for the worst. "You're always a little worried," Christiansen said. "You get a tickle at the pit of your stomach."
Economic analysts said North Dakota has already begun showing some of the painful ripples seen elsewhere. Some manufacturing companies here have lately made temporary job cuts as orders for products have dropped nationally. Shrinking 401(k) retirement plans are no bigger here than anywhere else. And, most of all, drops in oil prices and farm commodity prices are sure to sink local fortunes, experts said.
An economist at Moody's Economy.com recently warned that conditions in North Dakota had "slowed measurably in recent months, and the state is now at risk of being dragged into recession." In an interview, Glenn Wingard, the economist, described North Dakota as "an outlier" up to now in a broad, national slump.
Economy doing well in Fargo
they are inconsequential in any measurement I can think of. 
