Euro/Dollar comparisons

I've already confessed my unfortunate tendency to translate any statement made about the problems with Euro policy into dollar policy. Usually in my head I translate PIGS (Portugal, Italy, Greece, or Spain) into MAS (Mississippi, Arkansas, and all points South). US monetary policy is not set with Arkansas in mind, but no one calls for my senator's former stomping grounds to secede from the monetary union, unlike Greece.

It appears I've been comparing the wrong states though. Try California, my own former stomping grounds:

The Californian economy is four times larger relative to the US than the Greek one is relative to the Eurozone. Yet nothing remotely resembling the concern and turmoil in Europe about Greece has occurred in the US regarding California.

-- Jacques Melitz via Thought du Jour.