What if we measured state boundaries based on economic and population growth, and not borders? Fixr's map of state GDP per capita lets us visually compare the concentration of economic activities in relation to population. For example, you can see that Northeastern states are far ahead of the rest of the country in terms of GDP per capita:

Setting aside population, which may or may not be the best method to review economic growth, let's look at state-specific GDP growth between 2013 and 2014. This tells us how states are faring over the most recently available year's data. California, West Virginia, Wyoming, Texas, North Dakota, Colorado, Utah, Oregon, and Washington all showed strong gross state product (GSP) growth in the past year:

Alaska and Mississippi, on the other hand, saw their state GSPs shrink.