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Originally Posted by edale
Mostly agree, but taxes are influenced by politics. There was a lot of hype, especially from San Francisco tech bros, during the pandemic about Miami being the new 'it' place due to its politics being essentially the anti-SF. That loser Keith Rabois was a particularly vocal advocate for Miami, and it usually came down to politics and culture war type of stuff. There definitely is a contingent that moves to FL for its politics.
People don't similarly talk about Alabama, Oklahoma, Arkansas, etc. because they don't really have notable urban areas and economic prospects are fairly muted. There's no Miami, or even Orlando or Tampa equivalents in those states. No palm trees or beaches (AL's sliver of the Gulf Coast notwithstanding). Florida provides big cities, 'good' weather, AND far right politics. A trifecta for a large segment of the US population. It's like a flat, humid, conservative much shittier version of California!  |
Florida and Texas have no state income taxes. This plus weather is why people move there. The employment options follow (mainly in the case of Texas), and in turn, why their cities have burgeoned. This existed long before the FOX News and MAGA set, and certainly well before Greg Abbott and Ron DiSantis.
The "culture war" crap is political theater smokescreen to actually get people riled up, because taxes are boring. Not suggesting that there is not a contingent of right-wingers who might move for "the state politics"... but that contingent is certainly not what has fueled both states' consistently strong growth for decades throughout many state-level political administrations.