On that one, what state could compare to California? What would Los Angeles be without all its corporate military contractors and the Hoover Dam to electrify it? What would San Diego be without the Navy?
Military spending and the construction and maintenance of automobile highways and roads are the necessary basis for half the U.S. "private" sector.
The South sucks even more than the rest of the country, but I don't see how bashing it will solve this all too real problem. The only way out of the trap is to pursue the economic reconstruction of the whole working class. That would teach the bigots the errors of their ways.