[avgcorrection]

That’s terrible.

Is the primary reason overconsumption from farming (70% of the consumption according to Yahoo News)? If so then I guess they could import more agricultural products. That’s easier than having most of the residents use less water.

But another problem might be: where would the food come from? California also has a drought problem. I don’t know.

[yummypaint]

Much agricultural use of water in the american west is intentionally wasteful to protect the farmer's future rights to use water. Farmers are afraid of losing a possible edge over their neighbors if they do the right thing. Not providing a legal mechanism to fix this, even during this worsening crisis, is an utter failure of our country.

[Quenty]

The Midwest would be great. It’s right next door and the largest piece of arable land in the world.

[IIsi50MHz]

Water levels supporting much of midwest[1] farming and ranching have been dropping for decades, far faster than the refill rate. Even areas that have formed water-use co-operatives have been unable to convince themselves to reduce draw enough to matter. Even if they zeroed their usage, the co-ops don't cover enough land area to make up for the surrounding areas that are drawing from the same aquifer.

[1] Leaving aside the cultural oddity of USA-ians who think the living not only east of centre, but as far east as any part of Ohio, counts as "midwest".