Wednesday, December 22, 2010

The Exodus from "progressive" policies

Since the census results have been released, much has been made of the changes to the electoral map.

But little has been made of why the mass migration from traditional "blue states" to "red states" is occurring in the first place.

Of course, your average liberal would say something "scientific" like "people are moving to warmer climates". But how does that explain Louisiana, the state right next to Texas who lost an electoral vote?

Or why hasn't California picked up yet another electoral vote given their kick ass climate and economic opportunities.

But the lessons don't end there. How does one explain the exodus of people from our once great cities to suburban and exurban enclaves.

Take the city of Cincinnati for example. In 1960, the city population proper was over 500,000. After this census, the population will probably be just over 300,000.

Or take Cleveland, where the population in 1950 was 914,000 and will probably be just over 400,000 in this census.

The metro area populations have remained fairly stagnant for these cities which means that people are leaving the mess known as the cities for areas outside of the city. Why?

Once again, your liberals will tell you that "white flight" is the main cause of the exodus. But is it simply because of people's skin colors that they choose to move or maybe these people are simply using their cost/benefit principle to decide to move.

Think about it.

For more taxes you pay in the city, you get more crime, more urban decay, horrible city services (unless you're from the underclass) shitty schools, etc. In fact, like most liberal policies, there and implicit and explicit statement that if you are rich you are not welcome (sound familiar?).

As a result, anyone with any means has to make the call. I can stay here and fight to change the culture and/or policies or I can move to where I am more welcome. Oh, by the way, I'm taking my wealth and values with me.

Which choice is easier?

What the talking heads also haven't addressed is that the flight of people from blue to red is not equal across all socio-economic groups. They're almost all people with wealth, education, and stronger values, leaving the derelicts of society behind.

All this exacerbates the problems in blue areas. More poor people needing public assistance with fewer "rich" people to carry the load.

Just look at what happened in Oregon, who last year decided to beat on those asshole millionaires one more time..........

Oregon raised its income tax on the richest 2% of its residents last year to fix its budget hole, but now the state treasury admits it collected nearly one-third less revenue than the bean counters projected. ...

In 2009 the state legislature raised the tax rate to 10.8% on joint-filer income of between $250,000 and $500,000, and to 11% on income above $500,000. Only New York City's rate is higher. Oregon's liberal voters ratified the tax increase on individuals and another on businesses in January of this year, no doubt feeling good about their "shared sacrifice."

Congratulations. Instead of $180 million collected last year from the new tax, the state received $130 million. ...

One reason revenues are so low is that about one-quarter of the rich tax filers seem to have gone missing. The state expected 38,000 Oregonians to pay the higher tax, but only 28,000 did. Funny how that always happens. These numbers are in line with a Cascade Policy Institute study, based on interstate migration patterns, predicting that the tax surcharge would lead to 80,000 fewer wealthy tax filers in Oregon over the next decade. ...


So the "blue staters" can bitch and moan about how the rich don't pay enough all while the rich continue packing their bags and heading to places where they are wanted and appreciated.

Do you think that any liberals will pay attention to this "science" and change their policies accordingly?


1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Aurthur Laffer continuously being proved right with actual numbers, but continuously being ignored because the Laffer curve blows a gigantic hole in long worshipped leftist assumptions.

The concept is so straightforward: you want rich people to pay more? Allow the free market to prosper and more people to become rich. Unbelievable how many brain dead ivy leaguers are still out there still slurping up the raw tripe that they learned at Harvard and Yale.