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That’s actually not true, IIRC per capita we are actually better off than California and Nevada.

Edit: Just looked it up and california gets about 5 million acre feet (maf), AZ gets about 2.8maf and Nevada only gets 0.3maf.

So per capita, AZ is doing pretty well allocation-wise.

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"The Water Knife" by Paolo Bacigalupi, though near-future speculative fiction, gives a pretty solid explanation of the issues. Junior rights don't matter much when there isn't enough water

When I said, “bottom of the water rights”, I mean that the other states has senior water rights, not allocation per capita.

When there is not enough water, priority goes to those holding senior water rights.

(Complicating this is that various tribal nations have water rights senior to the states, and it is only now affecting allocations)

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