"Nearly all of Texas’ recent growth has been in populations of color, and its growth areas are as racially diverse as many places in California. Growth cities in Texas are not just racially diverse but also politically diverse, if you’re into that sort of thing. In Plano, a thriving suburb of Dallas, about 60 percent of voters are Democrats; in Menlo Park, a thriving suburb south of San Francisco, about 80 percent are — the difference between living among political allies and living in an echo chamber.
Then there are Texas’ climate risks. Houston will not do well on a warming planet — it is economically dependent on the oil and gas industry and is threatened by hurricanes and a surge in sea levels. But other big cities, including Dallas and Fort Worth, face more moderate risks, especially compared to many cities in California. Yes, Texas is very hot and likely to get hotter; but if a lot of other American cities also begin to get very hot, Texas cities might not feel as overheated by comparison. In addition to the risk of heat stress, Texas also faces the possibility of water shortages, but that will be true across much of the West, including California’s population centers.... The poor services and reactionary state politics bother me greatly, but I can see how, for a lot of people, low taxes and more living space could be inducement enough to overlook Texas’ apparent downsides."
So... did you understand why "everyone" is moving to Texas?
The top-rated comment over there: "This is like finding a life partner by algorithm; there's no emotion there. On a political level, I could never live in Texas and the only people I know moved there because of taxes. It's the same with Florida. Wealthy NYers move to these states because of taxes but still keep a place in NY because they can get away from heat and republicans. The minute the husband dies, the wives move back to NY for the children, the grandchildren and the cultural life. Until Texas becomes a state that women can have reproductive freedom, no thanks."
I love the way Madison is dangled for 2 seconds as a possible choice then dropped.
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So... did you understand why "everyone" is moving to Texas?
A belief that you can still be a Democrat without being forced to live with the actual consequences?
Oddly, this past winter was the worst cold we've had in over 20 years, and this summer was the mildest. Go, climate change!
As for reproductive freedom, Texas is conducting lawfare against abortion. Turnabout is fair play. Get Congress to pass rational abortion laws instead of letting the Supremes make law, & see if that works more to everyone's liking.
I make money building new houses for rich immigrant techies, in former Black & Hispanic parts of Austin. So am I increasing diversity putting whitey in those houses next door to PACIFIC, or destroying POC cultural enclaves?
Much of the world that is moving to Houston is from south Asia, like India and Indonesia... places that are as hot or hotter than Houston. Often in south Asian homes despite the heat and humidity (it's really not that bad) they're known NOT to run the air conditioning or if on it is set in the 80s, because they are used to and more comfortable with the heat and humidity, like back at home.
Cold weather isn't popular with a lot of folks around the world. So global warming is arguably going to be a boon for billions, but I'm not ever going to act like it is right around the corner and should factor into where anyone should move or not move today.
Also, Texas' Mexican-American population is leaning more and more Republican these days. Trump was very popular in the Indian-American community of Houston, as well.
Houston won’t do well in climate change and hurricanes; also Texas faces water shortages. Get your Gell-Mann in one story.
It is miserable here in Texas and like the commenter noted, women can’t just reproduce at will here. Better to stay in Madison, Portland, or California for the homogeneity rather than mix with Texans. Heck, what the article failed to note are the awful tornadoes in Dallas, which you can be sure global warming will just make worse. So just stay away. Heck SXSW is dangerous with all the anti-vaxxers around Austin. Why would you want to move here?
gilbar's top comment (as selected by, gilbar)
NO ONE Goes to Texas anymore.... It's TOO CROWDED
"get away from heat and republicans"
Dems! Remember! Stay away from us! We're almost as dangerous as climate change!
"The minute the husband dies, the wives move back to NY for the children, the grandchildren and the cultural life. Until Texas becomes a state that women can have reproductive freedom, no thanks."
Yes, Dem grandma, stay away from TX, since you can't have no reproductive freedom there.
By the way, apropos of nothing, does reproductive freedom include any responsibility? If so, does it include the responsibility, of free moral agents making moral decisions, to anticipate possible babies when having sex? Sorry. You see where this is going. Deplorable, I know. Dems! You don't want to be around us!
I always listen to the NYT and NY commenters when trying to understand Texas.
Cold weather isn't popular with a lot of folks around the world.
I've read that Somalian immigrants in Minneapolis set the heat in the winter in the 90s. The person informing the internet of this seemed scandalized by it. My first thought was of course they are. Why would you settle Somalians in Minneapolis of all places? Wouldn't South Florida make a lot more sense?
I'm reminded of a cold weather briefing I got one time when I was in the army. The lecturer was an actual MD and the briefing was witty. He stated that there were physiological differences between Northern Europeans and people of African descent that made the latter more susceptible to cold weather injuries. He also stated that at one time he wasn't allowed to say that, but that was OK because the black soldiers already knew it.
Wow! An NYT hit piece on a whole state! This is just so ... so NYT.
“Yes, Texas is very hot and likely to get hotter; but if a lot of other American cities also begin to get very hot, Texas cities might not feel as overheated by comparison.“ Ah. The obligatory climate change bullshit. Have these clowns* ever been in Minneapolis or Boston in the summertime? (*Three journolistas for this drivel?)
People and companies move to Texas to get away from the Reds like the ones who continue to destroy California.
Stanch the Blue Infection and their Pod Ways…
The way 'diversity' is working out in big cities, I will be looking for less of it if I move.
Or making sure there are Republicans in charge of the state.
Here's my example: I live in a neighborhood with very little crime. No murders, robberies, or rapes last year. Why would I want murderers, robbers, and rapists in my neighborhood? It would make the area criminally diverse, but diversity isn't always good for its own sake...
“Yes, Texas is very hot and likely to get hotter; but if a lot of other American cities also begin to get very hot, Texas cities might not feel as overheated by comparison.”
Oh, so while other cities “begin to get very hot” Texas cities will “get hotter” more slowly, or what?
The natives never leave, and if you move there and find a native significant other, you don't leave either. Texas has a unique level of state pride. Everything in the store is Texas beef, Texas this and Texas that. My daughter lives in San Antonio which experienced a summer where it never reached 100 degrees for the first time in years. The city was 50% Hispanic before everyone moved there and still is. What Texas has is a profound sense of community and civic pride which make other differences less relevant. It is more like the original hodgepodge of immigrants 100 years ago who just wanted to be Americans. The Texans are Texans first.
Every single person I know who's moved to Texas from a different state begins to say they're "from" Texas within about 12-48 months of being there and continues to say they're from Texas even when they move again to another state.
I live in Ohio but I'm from Kentucky. I actually really like Ohio but you'll never hear me say I'm "from" Ohio. There's simply something special with Texas.
I lived in TX for 9 years in the 1980s and I would move back in a heartbeat.
People move to Texas because of low taxes, sane government, and freedom.
And the "diverse" Texas population is increasingly voting Republican.
Wince FTW
Hurricanes, alligators, Republicans, DeSantis, and eight months of summer...
Save yourselves. Stay home.
Obviously the commenter has that famous New Yorker cartoon world view. Young people are coming to Florida to stay. One look at the Miami boom is all you need to know. Brickell area in Miami is nothing but young people from everywhere. Covid has changed the way cities will be. Once you can work from anywhere the dynamics change. naturally the commenter is so obtuse that he(?) thinks leaving for taxes is a minor reason for leaving and that they will be back later. All those wealthy New Yorkers who move to Florida for taxes but a keep homes in NYC for culture are astute enough to arrange that their income is mostly earned outside of NYC. In other words, they love NYC and its cultural life but not enough to pay the taxes.
Yes, global warming is such a problem that the mean temperature change in 1979 was about 0.25-deg C below the 1991-2000 average and is now about 0.25-deg C above that average. The global temperature hasn't changed much in the last 5 to 6 years.
The artic sea ice is quickly disappearing! NOT! The Antarctic sea ice is just below the recent averages.
The myth of global warming has morphed into climate change crisis when global warming stopped and the left needed a new boogieman.
"Diversity" is apparently yet another word that means both something and its opposite.
Farhad doesn't make Texas sound very attractive.
I sort of like the idea of "Keeping Austin Weird," but if Texas is just a gigantic New Jersey, count me out.
By “everyone” doesn’t he mean Californians? I’m CA born and raised but spent many adult years in NYC. When my husband and I recently moved to NE WI, a number of friends and family amusingly wondered how the politics of our new neighbors would impact us in finding new friendships. I spent my entire adult life in the bluest of areas, while personally being somewhat conservative. What I wanted - and have found - is people who spend more of their time working, talking about the Packers, complaining about IL tourists or about whether the new Kwik Trip in the big town south of us a good thing or not. In other words, politics is downstream from life. Exactly where it belongs. I feel sorry for those who think and live as if it’s the opposite,
"If you're state doesn't do thing the way I like I won't move there!" OK by me. Stay away.
As always, an article like this just reveals the narrow-minded prejudices of the left-wing author. He's worried about the effect of abortion laws on grannie? The weather is better in the north? Global warming is going to grab you next year?
He's totally right and all of them need to stay away from Texas, especially Houston. Move to Portland! I hear it's perfect there.
Yup--it's POC moving to Texas---the color is "blue" as in moving from California.
Please progressives --- stay out of Texas. And Florida. And please leave Virginia.
Even in most liberal jurisdictions with the most progressive policies, a woman does not have unrestricted rights to abort her child. Well, perhaps the most liberal, up to the fourth trimester, but only in darkness. Most restrict reproductive rites in the third trimester. Others to the second trimester.
There is no mystery in sex and conception of a child. A woman has reproductive freedom, four choices: abstention, prevention, adoption, and compassion, and still six weeks for a wicked solution (i.e. selective-child or one-child, delegated). Baby steps. A woman also has the right to self-defense for not a plausible, imminent, probable, but immediate threat to her viability posed by the pregnancy, with the caveat that a child's life should not be considered simply. The issue of involuntary exploitation, and perhaps superior exploitation, are separable edge cases, and, of course, Her Choice.
That said, diversity [dogma] is class-based bigotry that denies individual dignity, individual conscience, and intrinsic value. Diversity of individuals, minority of one. #HateLovesAbortion
IOW, all the liberals are moving to escape their Blue State hell holes. And they'll start making Texas anothe Blue state hell hole ASAP.
They did that with Colorado and they're working on Montana.
"I moved to Texas keep more of my money, how awful it is here because I can't inflict the policies that were bad enough to move across the country to escape out of NYC on everybody else." Classic parochial progressive admits to their personal greed.
I'm sure that Texans are heartbroken that the east coast Karens are moving back to New York.
On a political level, I could never live in Texas and the only people I know moved there because of taxes. It's the same with Florida. Wealthy NYers move to these states because of taxes but still keep a place in NY because they can get away from heat and republicans.
Heaven forfend that they focus on changing the tax rates in New York. No, they have to move to Texas, and then immediately demand that the rest of the state's politics and culture change to accommodate their sensibilities. And the GOP establishment falls for it. Screw that. Californians, New Yorkers, Wisconsinites, and every other blue-stater needs to stay the hell home.
Locusts moving to greener pastures.
That top commenter sounds like a real loser. NORMAL people aren't actually aware of, or concerned with, the party affiliation of ordinary people they encounter out in the real world. You really have to have warped values in order to make such sweeping judgments based solely on party identification.
I'm Texan born and raised, grew up in Houston. I've resided in Michigan the last 30 years, and you couldn't pay me to move back to Houston. The weather and layout suck.
Maybe it's changed.
Funny, I enjoy the Florida taxes but I moved here for the weather and the freedom. We have our share of New Yorker retirees here, but I have yet to see one of the widows leave because her husband died. The ones who keep a foot planted in the frozen North are snowbirds, not permanent residents, and with the Covid hysteria in the blue states they're staying til June now instead of April and coming back in early October instead of December because they enjoy the freedom too. Did I mention that in this over 55 city of 130,000 with an average age of 70.1 we have had zero deaths for the last month and the seven day average of daily cases has been between zero and a handful (zero right now.) That's despite a very active retired population, no mask mandates and not a lot of masks worn at all. In fact, if one sees a person wearing a mask it's probably a snowbird who hasn't yet figured it out. Covid is over here, at least for now. Remember to take your vitamin D and zinc folks and it could be over most everywhere.
Texas is what I’m used to, and I like what I’m used to.
I’m not sure if I’d say that if I lived in Houston or one of the other urban hellscapes along Interstate 35.
There is also some outmigration from Texas. I don't know who they are or why they are leaving and there are more people arriving than leaving, but they are part of the picture too.
It's striking that the Times doesn't even bother speaking to people who like Texas's political climate or even acknowledging that they exist.
Also, the commenter talks about rich ex-New Yorkers, but the ordinary, middle or working class ones are ignored. Do they adapt or are they homesick? The old neighborhood and familiar faces are probably missed more than high culture attractions that they can't afford.
I love when the NY Times tries to figure out why people move to Texas and Florida. And they always come up with a stereotyped person who did the move, somehow knowing just what those people were thinking. "For the taxes. Despite their fear of climate change in places like Houston."
Jeez. Such clone-like thinking.
People come here for a number of reasons. Taxes in Blue states are ridiculous- that's clear. But there's more than that. We're free here. We're allowed to work, play, go about our lives, knowing that it's up to us to judge the amount of risk we're willing to take. Our state government does not view business as an easy mark for extortion, to be sanctioned regularly until enough payoffs are met. Covid accentuated the chasm between freedom and being allowed to have responsibility for your own lives vs having government run amok on your life, threatening you if you did not follow it's bizarre commands. Say, Florida vs. New York during covid. And I love how those Climate Change apostles who worry that Florida is going to sink into the ocean still come down here to live. Once they are done scolding us, they'll settle into a nice life here. Like Nancy Pelosi who just bought a place on the East Coast of Florida (where all of her friends are going to end up settling).
One other key point. I noted this almost 30 years ago when I first moved to the South. I moved from Michigan (Detroit area) to Atlanta. And yes, like many northerners I had some preconceived notions about how bad race relations were in the South. This, coming from a guy from Detroit- not exactly an example of people living in peaceful harmony. When I got to Atlanta I saw a level of black and white people living, working, hanging out together, having fun together that I never saw in my years in Detroit, Chicago, or certainly Boston. It's most definitely not perfect down here, nor is it for everyone. But it works for many of us. Even those who profess to hate it.
"There is no mystery in sex and conception of a child."
On the contrary. I often ask myself when viewing a couple and their child, "What the hell does she see in HIM?!?!"
The provenance of many couples is often a mystery of deep profundity.
Yeah, the diversity. Is there anything it can't cure?
Liberal enclaves are self-reinforcing. Liberals can't bear to be around people who don't think like them so once a place gets a reputation for being liberal, liberals move there to be around other liberals. The more liberals move there, the more liberal it becomes. The more liberal it becomes, the more liberals want to move there. But conservatives, who, for the most part, are perfectly content with intellectual diversity, live in a bubble.
In Plano, a thriving suburb of Dallas, about 60 percent of voters are Democrats;
Heh - well, 10 years ago THAT wasn't true!
I looked at the recent redistricting maps. ALL the Red areas have moved even farther North (outside of Dallas). The Blue areas have just gotten bigger.
People now drive from McKinney and Argyle into Dallas for work (30-40 mile commute). What's better is, industry and office jobs have moved north to meet them.
Dallas itself is beginning to be a bit hollowed out.
Now, new restaurants and retailers always open their first restaurant in the northern 'burbs. The second or third unit will open in Dallas.
My guess is the 'Everyone' who's moving to Texas is fast on the task of ruining it.
My son and his daughter visited some colleges the summer of her senior year in high school. They visited Austin and decided it is a dump. The rest of Texas was much better but she decided on U of Alabama, which is about as far from California as you can get. I expect her parents to move to the southeast before she graduates.
Cougars will flock to Texas once Magic Mike is elected governor. This will turn Texas blue and the Dixie rebellion will be over.
Well, our 30 year old daughter and her husband moved earlier this year to an expanding town about 40 miles north of Dallas, and it was at least as much about being relieved of the stiffling progressive atmosphere here in the Northeast as it was about economic opportunities.
There are about 75,000 people in their town and it is projected to expand to over 350,000 IN THE NEXT THREE YEARS. Their new house, bought for $315,000, is now being sold in the same development for $435,000. This is in the past 6 months.
We've visited several times now and I can't get over how wonderfully friendly most people are, and how I no longer worry about experiencing social death if someone figures out that I voted for Trump. We may move there ourselves in the next few years. I can deal with the heat--it's 5-10 degrees hotter there than Philadelphia, but it's not humid. But I am really wondering if I can deal with the relative lack of trees and green. Walking around, there's no shade to be had---the sun is just ALWAYS UP THERE, relentless.
"Until Texas becomes a state that women can have reproductive freedom, no thanks."
Texans are delighted to learn this person will not be living among them.
Suits me just fine.
Also, we have this thing about the weather called historical data that withstands scrutiny quite well when one wishes to learn about the historical destruction of hurricanes and tornadoes, the observed advance of sea level as opposed to the crisis-inflamed theoretical one, and the actual recorded temperatures over history - which seem to be curiously cyclical, seasonably variable, and trending flat over time.
The large cities in Texas are positively dripping with culture, as anyone who ever lived in Texas can tell you.
"The minute the husband dies, the wives move back to NY for the children, the grandchildren and the cultural life. Until Texas becomes a state that women can have reproductive freedom, no thanks."
Grandmothers care deeply about the right to kill their offspring?
The provenance of many couples is often a mystery of deep profundity.
Couples and sex, sure. We really should manage our time better to balance the "equal in rights and complementary in Nature/nature" formula. That said, the profoundness of coupling can be assessed in secular motives, but also the rejection of diversity [dogma] (i.e. color judgments). Lust, perhaps love, at first sight are necessary, but insufficient for a long-term relationship.
Texas is boring and the weather sucks.
why don't these writers/commenters undertake the lived experience approach by renting house / apartment in TX cities and then essay their life-results.
that should take care of the algorithm problem
@9:29: “People and companies move to Texas to get away from the Reds like the ones who continue to destroy California.”
Should read “blues”, not “reds.”
"Until Texas becomes a state that women can have reproductive freedom, no thanks."
-------------
i suspect this is not someone of ovarian-vagina persuasion but a dangler propenison who splooges and does not want to be stooges.
Grandmothers care deeply about the right to kill their offspring?
Not their children or grandchildren, but their great and great-great grandchildren. Sacrificing virgins is an ancient rite of social progress and climate mitigation.
a dangler propenison who splooges and does not want to be stooges
Ah, the masculinist or "splooge stooge".
To me, Austin is concentrated Texas. It's too big, and there aren't enough trees. Some of friends rave about the place but I have never been that impressed.
My wife ran into some visitors from the Snowlands in front of Elvis' (Audubon Drive) house, as often happens. They, and a neighbor who lived much closer to the place and had been there much longer, chatted for a while.
The visitors marveled at the nice neighborhoods they had seen, and couldn't believe house prices, which are still low compared to a lot of other markets.
Saw a surprising amount of ethnic diversity--used to do a little physical anthropologiy, so I watch--at the Twelve Days of Christmas exhibit at the Dallas Arboretum. Wow.
More surprising was the staff and customers at the grocery store in Banner Elk, NC, up in the Blue Ridge. Then I discovered it was an area where the moneyed went to escape the heat of the coastal south. And now they have skiing. Which means money, too. Which is not restricted to white people. Maybe another venue for another "Plain Tales From The Hills".
Ran into a lady from the Democratic Republic of Congo She'd spent twelve years in Grand Rapids, but ultimately moved to work at Emory Mediical Center in Atlanta. One of the few working there who know how to drive in snow.
"On a political level, I could never live in Texas and the only people I know moved there because of taxes. It's the same with Florida. Wealthy NYers move to these states because of taxes but still keep a place in NY because they can get away from heat and republicans. The minute the husband dies, the wives move back to NY for the children, the grandchildren and the cultural life. Until Texas becomes a state that women can have reproductive freedom, no thanks."
That's very much the sort of comment that a wealthy New Yorker living in a bubble with other wealthy New Yorkers would make. In a battle of anecdotes, I know a lot of middle income people from the northeast who either can't wait to move to places like FL and TX or have moved already and wonder why they didn't move years before. These people will not be going back north.
The wealthy can afford to go back to New York. The blue collar and middle income folks I know who go to Florida love the friendlier cost of living, the friendlier business climate, and, yes, I would say that in most cases, they also appreciate the more conservative political environment. This is one reason that places like NY, NJ, and CT are becoming bluer and bluer while increasing income inequality. Blue collar and middle income people, who tend to be more moderate or conservative, move out, and (gross generalization) only the wealthy and the subsidized low income population (heavily Democratic, both) can afford to remain in the northeast, which just reinforces the migration pattern. I'm old enough to remember when NJ and CT were legitimate swing states, but those days are long gone.
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