{"id":228862,"date":"2026-02-01T08:00:32","date_gmt":"2026-02-01T18:00:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/?p=228862"},"modified":"2026-02-01T08:42:24","modified_gmt":"2026-02-01T18:42:24","slug":"hawaii-economy-among-worst-in-nation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/2026\/02\/01\/hawaii-economy-among-worst-in-nation\/","title":{"rendered":"Adjusted for local prices, Â鶹´«Ã½\u2019s economy among worst in nation, UHERO<\/abbr> finds"},"content":{"rendered":"
Reading time: <\/span> 2<\/span> minutes<\/span><\/span>

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Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> residents earn about average incomes for the U.S.—but that money doesn\u2019t go nearly as far as it does in other parts of the country. After adjusting for the state\u2019s sky-high cost of living, a new report from the University of Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> Economic Research Organization<\/a> (UHERO<\/abbr>) shows that Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span>\u2019s wages and productivity have lagged the rest of the country for more than three decades, placing the state among the most economically distressed in the U.S.<\/p>\n[vc_row][vc_column][vc_video link=”https:\/\/youtube.com\/shorts\/i5QDassuwYg” el_aspect=”916″ align=”right” el_id=”wrap-video-right”][vc_column_text]\n

The report, “Beyond the price of paradise: Is Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> being left behind?,” released on February 1, documents how Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span>\u2019s per-person GDP<\/abbr>, income and productivity growth have stagnated since the early 1990s. On paper, Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span>\u2019s economy appears to perform roughly on par with the U.S. average. As a result, when residents feel economic distress, the blame is often placed almost entirely on the high cost of living.<\/p>\n

However, once incomes are adjusted for local prices (the actual price of goods and services in Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span>), Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span>\u2019s long-run trajectory also looks far weaker than previously understood. The report concludes that addressing the underlying weakness in the state\u2019s economic path is at least as important—and perhaps more important—than addressing the cost of living itself.<\/p>\n

“Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span>\u2019s tourism economy is regularly hit by short-term crises. But our analysis shows the state has also been facing a slow-moving crisis for more than 30 years,” said lead author and UHERO<\/abbr> Assistant Professor Steven Bond-Smith. “Once we account for Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span>\u2019s high prices, the state looks increasingly similar to regions on the U.S. continent widely recognized as economically distressed, such as parts of Appalachia, the rural South and the Mississippi Delta where the lower cost of living cushions their lower earnings. But this type of economic distress is not just about the cost of living\u2014it reflects decades of weak income and productivity growth.”<\/p>\n

Key findings include:<\/p>\n