Throughout the semester I chose the Southwestern portion of the United States to research. I learned a lot about the region as a whole, and how it is very different from other regions in the United States. The Southwestern consists of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, Southern California, Southern Nevada, Southern Utah, and Southern Colorado. The climate is very hot and fairly dry, as there is not a whole lot of annual precipitation. The physical geography is overall flat, however there are areas in this region that do have elevated areas. Much of this area is desert, and the United States largest desert, The Mojave Desert, is located in this region. This region is riddled with United States National parks including, Grand Canyon National Park, Death Valley National Park, Mojave National Park, Petrified Forest National Park, Sequoia National Park, and Great Bend National Park. Refined petroleum, crude petroleum, and petroleum gas are all very important exports of this area because it is found naturally occurring in several of these states, and there are many pipelines and refineries in this region. Refined Petroleum accounts for $8.93 Billion, crude petroleum accounts for $7.46 Billion, and petroleum gas accounts for $6.89 Billion. This shows just how much this area contributes to the overall wealth of the United States as a whole. Though this area is contributing a lot to the overall wealth of the United States it is still a very poor region. In 2018 17% of Texas’s population was comprised of 4.3 million immigrants. Out of those 4.3 million immigrants 1.6 million or 33% of them are undocumented. Out of all of these immigrants only 20% were able to obtain a high school diploma. This only makes it difficult for a significant part of the population to get high paying jobs, which forces many citizens in this region to live in poverty. New Mexico has a poverty rate of 17.5%, Texas has a poverty rate of 13.6%, and Arizona is right behind with a rate of 13.5%. This results in many citizens of this region having to work low paying jobs that are physically demanding and exhausting. Another very interesting thing about this region is that it shares a border with Mexico. In 2021 there were over 1.6 million encounters between the United State Border Patrol and migrants at the U.S. Mexican Border. Compared to 2020 which only had 400,000 encounters, thought to be decreased by the Coronavirus, 2021 encounters increased at a very alarming rate and more than the previous highest annual total on record. 27% of these migrants are people who have tried to enter the U.S. before but were denied. In December 2021 alone there were over 5,100 migrants waiting and trying to get across the border every single day. These statistics show just how much of an issue the border of the Southwestern states and Mexico really is. Many of these cases are children trying to enter the United States, and in November and December of 2021 there were a combined 25,858 encounters with children who were not accompanied by an adult. This is a very scary thought, especially considering that 13,000 of these children were turned away from the border.
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