Article by Naomi Klein: The Battle for Paradise; In the Rubble of Hurricane Maria, Puerto Ricans and Ultrarich “Puertopians” Are Locked in a Pitched Struggle Over How to Remake the Island

U.S. Virgin Islands on Road to Recovery Six Months After Hurricanes

In Puerto Rico, a skirmish over how much debt the bankrupt island can handle.
Will the money go to bondholders or to disaster victims?

Yet another unique problem that PR has and one that poses serious concerns for the recovery process.

From the NY Times: Puerto Rico Needs More Than Bandages.

Puerto Rico needs more than bandages. It needs to rethink and redesign its electric, water and wastewater systems, both to protect them against the next big storm and to provide the dependable service they were failing to give residents before Hurricane Maria. To accomplish that and other rebuilding needs, Puerto Rico had sought $94.4 billion in total disaster aid in November. That included nearly $18 billion to rebuild the power grid — nine times what Congress has provided.

Achieving resiliency in the face of powerful storms will require the wholesale rebuilding of the island’s utilities. Simply patching them up will not be enough. If that’s the extent of the fix, the island is likely to find itself back in the same place after the next big storm, with taxpayers asked to spend new billions on more life preservers.

From the NYTimes on Feb. 9, right after the second short federal shutdown: What Puerto Rico Is and Isn’t Getting in Disaster Relief.

From Vox, this article re Puerto Rico’s blackout, the largest in American history, explained. More than a million Americans are still without power because of the botched recovery after the hurricane.

Puerto Rico has been in the news frequently, but apparently conditions in the USVI are quite serious as well. See this article in the Washington Post: Shredded roofs, shattered lives. Back-to-back hurricanes may have blown a generation of Virgin Islanders out of the middle class.

If Congress and the White House fail to deliver a massive infusion of cash to the islands, analysts warn, this Caribbean paradise could quickly unravel into a permanent decline that would send thousands of economic refugees to the mainland.

As the old saying goes, never let a crisis go to waste.  While many of us are wondering what it will take to achieve recovery in PR, some entrepreneurs have a plan.

From the NY Times: Making a Crypto Utopia in Puerto Rico. An excerpt from the article:

Puerto Rico offers an unparalleled tax incentive: no federal personal income taxes, no capital gains tax and favorable business taxes — all without having to renounce your American citizenship.

The Diva wants to point out that during recovery some business interests that are not those most desirable by many will consider the disaster an opportunity — for example, casino owners move quickly to acquire coastal property.  This crypto currency venture is a new one.