Other players cities producing more resources than mine

I'm new to the game and the first thing I did on day 1 was build industry in all my cities. Day 2 just started and when I looked at the newspaper there was a stat for the largest economies and I wasn't even in the top 25. The #1 spot was New Mexico so I went and clicked on their cities and they haven't built one building yet, the only one I saw was their capitol building. For some reason they are producing over a thousand more resources per city than I am. They haven't built anything and haven't attacked any of their neighbors yet so I'm assuming they have been afk the entire game so far.

What am I doing wrong? How are afk players with no industry buildings producing more than me? I have higher morale in all my cities as well.