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Is Life Better in America’s Red States?
New York Times ^ | 01/04/2015 | By RICHARD FLORIDA

Posted on 01/04/2015 12:01:43 PM PST by SeekAndFind

The new Congress that starts work this week is the latest reminder of America’s stark political divisions: The parties in Washington are more polarized than they have been in decades, the partisanship gap between rural Republicans and urban Democrats has grown, and the battle for suburban voters keeps intensifying. Much less is said, however, about the equally significant economic division between conservative “red states” and liberal “blue states.”

Blue states, like California, New York and Illinois, whose economies turn on finance, trade and knowledge, are generally richer than red states. But red states, like Texas, Georgia and Utah, have done a better job over all of offering a higher standard of living relative to housing costs. That basic economic fact not only helps explain why the nation’s electoral map got so much redder in the November midterm elections, but also why America’s prosperity is in jeopardy.

Red state economies based on energy extraction, agriculture and suburban sprawl may have lower wages, higher poverty rates and lower levels of education on average than those of blue states — but their residents also benefit from much lower costs of living. For a middle-class person , the American dream of a big house with a backyard and a couple of cars is much more achievable in low-tax Arizona than in deep-blue Massachusetts. As Jed Kolko, chief economist of Trulia, recently noted, housing costs almost twice as much in deep-blue markets ($227 per square foot) than in red markets ($119).

(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Culture/Society; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: life; redstates; richardflorida
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1 posted on 01/04/2015 12:01:44 PM PST by SeekAndFind
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To: SeekAndFind

And probably safer as well ...


2 posted on 01/04/2015 12:02:43 PM PST by SkyDancer
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To: SeekAndFind

federal tax money (our money) pours into blue states ... that’s how they buy the votes


3 posted on 01/04/2015 12:03:56 PM PST by sten (fighting tyranny never goes out of style)
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To: SeekAndFind

A question asked by the New York Times? I think I already know their answer.


4 posted on 01/04/2015 12:04:30 PM PST by Jagdgewehr (It will take blood.)
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To: SkyDancer

There are more guns in the Conservative states so they are much safer than the liberal cesspools. More importantly, Christian (and Jewish) values are still key in the so-called “red” states. That means a respect for God’s Laws resulting in a pro-life outlook. Likewise, due to a Biblical foundation, those states have better, longer-lasting marriages and a solid family life. And because the Ten Commandments are central to Conservatism, the overall quality of life is much better as evidenced by lower crime rates and a civility not found in commie states.


5 posted on 01/04/2015 12:08:40 PM PST by re_nortex (DP - that's what I like about Texas)
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To: SeekAndFind

Technically if the cost of living is lower in the Red States...meaning our dollar goes farther...wouldn’t that mean we are richer and actually financially smarter than blue staters?


6 posted on 01/04/2015 12:11:46 PM PST by EBH (And the angel poured out his cup...)
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To: SeekAndFind
and lower levels of education on average than those of blue states

Then why did Gruber call them stupid?

7 posted on 01/04/2015 12:13:19 PM PST by Libloather (Embrace the suck)
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To: Jagdgewehr

Setting up the pins to send their unwanteds packing from their decimated blue states so they can destroy thriving red states which are muchbbetter off because of the type people that live in them - non-drug users, Christian, hard working, responsible and law abiding; in other words, respectable unlike their blue state counterparts.


8 posted on 01/04/2015 12:15:51 PM PST by jsanders2001
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To: SeekAndFind

Even James Carville says it’s not the economy, stupid. It is the government’s full-bore path into tyranny.

New phrase: “It’s the liberty, stupid!”


9 posted on 01/04/2015 12:17:01 PM PST by BuckeyeTexan (There are those that break and bend. I'm the other kind. ~Steve Earle)
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To: SeekAndFind

Deep Blue states used to be Red States.

Expanding industry, economic growth, expanding housing opportunities, cutting edge technology was all established in the currently Deep Blue states many years ago, when they would have been defined as “Red”.
They have been resting-on-their-laurels for many years, stifling further growth with anti-competitive regulation.
Demo-sclerosis or Progressive Cancer brought these former growth engines to their knees.

Progressive government policies, crony capitalism and environmental lunacy are destroying the country. Leave out Silicon Valley and look at California. Leave out Wall Street and look at New York. Leave out the Education establishment and look at Massachusetts.
Illinois is already on life-support.

A Constitutional Warrior is what we need.

Hey Ted, ‘ya busy?


10 posted on 01/04/2015 12:19:43 PM PST by Macoozie (1) Win the Senate 2) Repeal Obamacare 3) Impeach Roberts)
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To: SeekAndFind

Another NEW FACTOR to keep an eye on is gun control.

Give a person from a gun-rights state a chance to work in a gun-grabbing state, even at HIGHER PAY, there’s a good chance they’ll say HELL NO, as they won’t want to part with their guns. Make the offer the opposite way - where a person from a gun-grabbing state (and that never owned a gun) is given a good job offer in Texas, for example, the gun control argument will simply not be a factor - as people that decide NOT to own guns are also welcome in Texas.

This is just starting to be a factor, due to some of the draconian gun control just passed in Blue States, but I see it with my kids (here in Texas) and their friends...and it will be more and more of a factor in the future.


11 posted on 01/04/2015 12:22:14 PM PST by BobL (REPUBLICANS - Fight for the WHITE VOTE...and you will win.)
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To: SeekAndFind
Clipped from New jersey news 12:

New Jersey is number one, but it's not on a list to be proud of.

According to the 2014 Annual National Movers Study, New Jersey has the most number of people leaving the state.

Last year, 65 percent of moves in New Jersey were people leaving the state.

So there's an indication of how awful this blue state has become.

12 posted on 01/04/2015 12:22:53 PM PST by Hoboken (A billion broken eggs...no omelette.)
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To: SeekAndFind

It’s a trick article, biased wholly to the left. And part of what they are tracking is due to a federal focus on inequality. Believe it or not, states with a huge range of incomes are freer than others who don’t. Freedom means choices and upward mobility, but includes the freedom to be dirt poor as well. Dirt poor should be highly motivating to do better, but when people are kept comfortably dirt poor but no fear of no housing or food, where is the motivation? And where industry is always hog tied, high incomes are stunted.

Right now you have too much federal interference in any state. Obama trying to harm the nation pits states against each other, which our nation was not founded to do. Each state should be free of restrictions so that it can conduct its own experiments.


13 posted on 01/04/2015 12:23:48 PM PST by Yaelle
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To: SeekAndFind

“Blue state knowledge economy.” Spoken like a true liberal elitist. WTF does he think enabled the extraction of oil and natural gas in the red states?

Knowledge, research & development, dumbass.


14 posted on 01/04/2015 12:25:28 PM PST by BuckeyeTexan (There are those that break and bend. I'm the other kind. ~Steve Earle)
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To: SeekAndFind

I recently moved from California, to Texas.

Not by choice, my position was eliminated, and this is where I found a new one.

However Texas has a much more robust jobs market, than California does. Cali is a mess.

However California still ranks high in many people’s minds. This morning I went to the grocery store. I was talking for couple of moments to the check-out clerk.

He asked where I came from, and I mentioned Los Angeles.

Now here I was at a grocery store near Dallas, yet the guy was totally sold on California. Seemed on the ball, as well.

He wasn’t just saying that to be polite.

I didn’t try to change his mind or anything, but Cali does not seem to me anyway, to be growing and succeeding at the moment.

Texas is booming.

The two states to me, more or less define “Red State” and “Blue State”.


15 posted on 01/04/2015 12:25:56 PM PST by Cringing Negativism Network (http://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/c5700.html)
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To: SeekAndFind
As Jed Kolko, chief economist of Trulia, recently noted, housing costs almost twice as much in deep-blue markets ($227 per square foot) than in red markets ($119).

But, it's too much of a leap for the NY Times to realize that it is "blue state" politics that inflates the cost of living in those states.

The blue states make it harder to build, and their redistribution of income draws in the dependent class, who snatch up any affordable housing.

16 posted on 01/04/2015 12:26:56 PM PST by justlurking (tagline removed, as demanded by Admin Moderator)
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To: Cringing Negativism Network
I didn’t try to change his mind or anything, but Cali does not seem to me anyway, to be growing and succeeding at the moment.

I'll buy him a bus ticket to California, if he promises to not come back.

17 posted on 01/04/2015 12:28:29 PM PST by justlurking (tagline removed, as demanded by Admin Moderator)
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To: re_nortex

Gun crime is less in red states - guess liberal gun laws help.


18 posted on 01/04/2015 12:31:12 PM PST by SkyDancer
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To: SeekAndFind

This writer, Richard Florida, has been banging the drum for years about metro areas needing certain things in order to draw the young, “creative class” that make city living “interesting, vibrant, etc.” When you looked deeper and begin to understand his coding, it came down to needing more fudge-packing artistes. Cities were paying him big $$$ to come in and give this stupid advice.


19 posted on 01/04/2015 12:33:24 PM PST by T-Bird45 (It feels like the seventies, and it shouldn't.)
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To: SeekAndFind

No. Absolutely not. They are backward ignorant hell holes you Blue staters should avoid at all costs.
Don’t go there and NEVER consider moving to one.


20 posted on 01/04/2015 12:45:50 PM PST by Kozak ("It may be dangerous to be America's enemy, but to be America's friend is fatal" Henry Kissinger)
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