Drought and Unemployment – San Joaquin Valley, CA

Despair flows as fields go dry and unemployment rises, By Alana Semuels, July 6, 2009, Los Angeles Times: “Water built the semi-arid San Joaquin Valley into an agricultural powerhouse. Drought and irrigation battles now threaten to turn huge swaths of it into a dust bowl.  Farmers have idled half a million acres of once-productive ground and are laying off legions of farmhands. That’s sending joblessness soaring in a region already plagued by chronic poverty…”