Texas Tanks COVID-19 Comeback
We still have some fighting back to do.
WalletHub puts Texas as 38th in the "States Recovering Quickest From COVID" survey. This is surprising to me because I thought that although we were on a tricky path in some ways we were generally doing better.
Dragging Texas down were the "COVID Health" and "Economy and Labor Market" categories (41st and 44th respectively), with the only positive being the Travel And Leisure category (a nice strong 17th). If you'd like a closer look at how all these categories are defined, you can find that here.
Our friends in New Mexico perform slightly better, coming in at 40th overall, with more middling results across the board.
It's tough to tell Texans that not everything is alright just yet. It sure seems like about 99 percent of the population thinks that everything is back to normal, with only the occasional mask wearer popping in to remind us that these times are still a little dangerous. I'm also seeing some businesses drop plexiglass barriers. I thought those would continue to be a thing forever. Hand sanitizing stations also seem to be drying up as well.
As for the rest of the U.S., the top five COVID-19 comeback kids are both surprising and not-so-surprising, with South Dakota, Iowa, Maine, Nebraska, and Vermont taking the top spots. Coming in dead last are Arkansas, Nevada, Wyoming, Arizona, and Missouri.