Yep, most of the people leaving those blue states are leaving due to high cost of living and going to cheaper states. The HCOL means they’re likely from metropolitan areas, meaning they’re likely democrat voters. Very few of them are going to rural areas, they’re going to cities in the cheaper states. This will have a bigger impact on presidential elections than congress, due to gerrymandered maps. It might be enough to flip these states as they’re all-or-nothing states.
gdog05@lemmy.world 6 days ago
Something missing from the displayed data, not sure if the article goes into it (not going through NYT paywall bullshit to find out) but Idaho, Utah and Texas will very likely gain a blue voting electoral college vote. If, after this Trump bullshit concludes (providing it concludes), we don’t have a major overhaul of how elections work including a change to first past the post, we kind of deserve fascism or all out civil war.
yaroto98@lemmy.world 6 days ago
Know_not_Scotty_does@lemmy.world 6 days ago
They are in for a shock if they come to Texas thinking is cheaper. The property taxes and insurance on houses is crazy here and can be counted on to increase at 10% per year. I went back and looked at my homeowners policy from 2016 vs 2025 and I started out paying $1600 per year and just paid $4800 for worse coverage this year. No claims or anything, I don’t live near the coast, not in a flood zone, not in a forest, no history of damaging hail, roof was replaced in 2016.
IllNess@infosec.pub 6 days ago
Also having no state income tax doesn’t mean you take more home, it means companies adjust the salary so you basically take home the same or even less. Sales tax is also high, about the same as NYC and SF.
njm1314@lemmy.world 6 days ago
Plus way less services.
yaroto98@lemmy.world 6 days ago
I bet it is getting more expensive, but it probably hasn’t hit the same heights as silicon valley/san francisco where a small condo is 1mil.
Skullgrid@lemmy.world 6 days ago
This will have a bigger impact on presidential elections than congress, due to gerrymandered maps. It might be enough to flip these states as they’re all-or-nothing states.
great, so more “I’m a blue president, but yikes, we don’t has congress :( pwease vote in midterms” presidents.
yaroto98@lemmy.world 6 days ago
Yep! Always expect more excuses from the govt. Just like your boss telling you the economy is bad so they can’t give you a raise despite pulling in record profits, you really can’t get a raise because they answer to investors not you. The govt answers to donors not voters. So any excuse to not do something for you will be used. Regardless of the political pins they wear.
kmartburrito@lemmy.world 6 days ago
Thank you for pointing out the issues with fptp - so many people don’t understand just how big of an issue it really is. We will never see the change we want (or honestly any real change at all) without abandoning it. Not to diminish your other valid points, I just have a particular passion about that one.
baronvonj@lemmy.world 6 days ago
eh? Not sure I’m understanding you. EC votes in Texas are winner-takes-all.
gdog05@lemmy.world 6 days ago
You’re right, we’ve got several states, mostly Republican leaning, that are winner take all. But these extra blue seats could potentially allow for an entire state swing in some states as yaroto98 pointed out. If it doesn’t do that, what it will do is piss enough people off because they’re not represented to get the groundswell needed to force changes.
baronvonj@lemmy.world 6 days ago
Only 2 states have proportional EC votes (Maine and Nebraska). So we’d have to get Democratic candidates winning the statewide vote.
A lot of the people moving to red states from blue are actually conservatives who want to live somewhere with Republican governments. In 2018 Beto won with native Texans but Republican-voting transplants tipped it for Cruz. I think we already have the overall population demographics to flip, if we could just get enough people to actually come out and vote.