Puerto Rico also has had corruption problems that may or may not be linked to the classical problems of people appointing friends to positions, inefficient allocation of resources such that wealthier areas are better maintained and have more of the ear of the government when it comes to acquiring resources to keep things maintained. Nothing involving governments is ever totally perfect or fair so there will always be a situation where it is who you know that counts.
After Maria, the federal response to the destruction was inefficient and inadequate to restore things to their previous state. As you find in any disaster on the mainland, the cleanup operations failed to vet contractors to insure that those doing the work actually had experience managing a complex process like hurricane cleanup and as a result there was massive waste. That's become the normal condition for US post-disaster operations so this is not a knock on PR at all.
I would love to visit. I have read a lot about it. One day it might happen. Good luck to all who choose PR as their home.
For them Puerto Rico is the perfect place to be to retain their American citizenship, eat fantastic food, enjoy an awesome lifestyle at a large discount, while avoiding tax liabilities.
Libertarians who operate investment newsletters have been touting the advantages of selling out here and moving to PR for years. They are not alone, as pastor_bob notes there are plenty of other people with the means and the opportunity to flee the mainland so they can watch it burn down from a distance while still enjoying the benefits of citizenship but in a more tax-advantageous location.
It was actually pretty funny reading their bitching about the state of things on the island after Hurricane Maria. Motherfuckers actually had to endure hardships getting their internet access restored so they could publish their rags and then they filled them with gripes about what a hardship it was dealing with the disaster even though they kept themselves isolated in their compounds so they never saw the true scope of the devastation that PR natives endured.
Fucking Grifters.