Washington, D.C. is a one-company town. And oh, what a company to work for:

The three most prosperous large counties in the United States are in the Washington suburbs, according to census figures released yesterday, which show that the region has the second-highest income and the least poverty of any major metropolitan area in the country. …
That accumulation of suburban wealth, local economists said, is a side effect of the enormous flow of federal money into the region through contracts for defense and homeland security work in the five years since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, coming after the local technology boom of the 1990s.

Something tells me that this has been going on a lot longer than 9/11 and the tech boom. I’ve heard it said that funeral homes are excellent small businesses because they’re recession proof. You could say that same thing about Washington. Death and taxes, you know.