North Dakota Democratic-Nonpartisan League Party - Today in North Dakota

Today in North Dakota

North Dakota has the lowest unemployment rate of all 50 states. Many reasons are associated with this fact. Most importantly is the variable of population, North Dakota citizens’ number 672,591 ranking third smallest in terms of population. A small migration of the unemployed are headed to North Dakota according to recent studies. A USA Today study points out some of the state’s largest cities are growing even larger.

Economists are both impressed and speculative of the reasons for the States resiliencies toward the recent economic hardships most governments and citizens are experiencing. The Nonpartisan League laid a foundation of enriched public ownership and responsibility in such institutions as a State Bank. One study has drawn conclusions that it is these publicly operated institutions such as the state bank that has helped North Dakota Citizens weather the economic storms of today.

The Bank of North Dakota was created to address market failures associated with monopoly power among large financial and business institutions in the early twentieth century. This Market power meant that small farming operations had inadequate access to credit. One of the goals of the league was to remedy limited access to credit by establishing this institution. A measure of the public good that still stands today and some point to it as playing a role in lessoning the impact of economic recession. It is safe to say the public-private relationship establishes roles assigned according to what each sector does best, a mutual benefit, of public and private banks balancing out inequality and building equality, and a safety net for North Dakota citizens. Praise for the early roots of the Democratic-Nonpartisan League party for establishing a foundation that rights the state in times of national crisis and secures the agrarian futures of farming families for generations to come.