OCEAN CITY, MARYLAND

Here, in a boardwalk caricature, comes the current American dilemma: How much prosperity is too much? This was an easy town to get rich in if you timed things right. But those blessings now carry burdens. The townsfolk have gone from acquiring wealth to managing it--knowing when to cut the right deal and let other ones go by. At Bunting's English Diner, where Mayor Jim Mathias and three of his predecessors gather early to sort through the day's problems, they like to recall how simple it used to be. Back in the '30s, when their fathers came to build the WPA beach-front barriers, vacant lots were auctioned for $50 apiece. "Anyone who bought land and held onto it made money," says Fish Powell, especially after Highway 50 connected the Eastern Shore to the restless mainland. Now the price of a lot is in the high five figures, as the town's permanent population of 6,000 swells to 300,000 at the peak of the summer. So lately the conversation is all about handling growth, about seasonal workers and traffic flow and the "shadow laws" that prevent builders from stacking high-rises so densely that they darken the shoreline. The resort town agreed to designate Coca-Cola the official drink at its festivals; that brings in $1 million over five years, enough to cut a penny from the property-tax rate. But Ocean City is a "crab-and-beer town, a pizza-and-popcorn town," say the town elders, and they draw the line at gambling. If Donald Trump tried to open up shop, the mayors agree, he would run into a hornet's nest.