Driving through its Georgia O’Keeffe mountains or under its aurora-clear skies, it’s easy to forget that New Mexico regularly tops the list in various poverty rankings. Americans willing to live side by side with UFO museums, the Very Large Array and the weapon to end all wars also claim the distinction of being number one in child hunger, poverty and school dropout rates.
Truth or Consequences, population 6,000 and home to the Spaceport America Visitor Center, is one of the poorest places in the state. It is a skin-of-its-teeth tourist town, and now a portal to another world.
The Guardian in a report “Space travel for the 1%: Virgin Galactic’s $250,000 tickets haunt New Mexico town.”