"Like thousands of Navajos on the reservation, where jobs are scarce, artist Elizabeth Whitethorne-Benally makes a living selling arts and crafts. But now her living room in the little town of Shonto in far northern Arizona is stuffed with unsold art.

"I was on the forefront of the stern of the economic downfall, because it went down with me," Whitethorne-Benally says as she stands in front of a huge painting done on blocks of wood recycled from old sheep corrals.

The recession has been a mixed bag for the country's more than 500 Indian tribes. Some urban reservations have continued their remarkable boom over the past couple of decades, despite the economic downturn.

But many rural tribes are still struggling — and Navajo Nation President Joe Shirley says the recession has made his people "more poor." And only now, billions of stimulus dollars earmarked for Indian country are starting to trickle in.

Besides keeping tabs on her art sales, Whitethorne-Benally also gauges the recession's impact by the number of men she sees hanging around. Many of them are Navajo construction workers who lost their jobs when the housing markets crashed in Phoenix and Las Vegas.

Robert Black, who is a chapter manager — which is like a city manager — on the reservation, says he has seen the recession's impact.

"It's not too surprising if you see a guy who's normally making $25 an hour, who says, 'I'll settle for $9 for a couple weeks so I can have some gas money to carry me over to my next job,' " Black says."

Get the Story:
On Rural Navajo Reservation, Jobs Are Still Scarce (National Public Radio 10/21)

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