9 ms·

There's plenty of talent already here in Texas; we don't need talent to follow the money from anywhere thanks Although it's welcome to if it will, and that's w

There's plenty of talent already here in Texas; we don't need talent to follow the money from anywhere thanks Although it's welcome to if it will, and that's why Texas is home to America's most diverse city, Houston

ryder9 6y ago
lmao
aNoob7000 6y ago
I'm not trying to make this political, but with all the migration to Texas it will be interesting to see if it remains a strongly Republican state in the future. I live in Georgia and I can see the demographics changing quite a lot.
- rootusrootus 6y ago
  IMO the idea of red states and blue states doesn't make a lot of sense. Remove the state boundaries and the real defining characteristic for red/blue is urban/rural. It need not be any more complicated than that.
  - hindsightbias 6y ago
    In TX it is more complicated. The cities and farms were blue until all those folks from out-of-state moved into new suburbs and retired to exurbs. The suburbs have controlled TX for about 30 years. What's left of real rural folk doesn't matter except in the local statehouse.
  - api 6y ago
    It’s a shocking almost perfect correlation, and it’s intensifying. The suburbs are starting to turn blue, especially around large cities, leaving the Republican Party an almost pure rural party.
  - pc86 6y ago
    I mean, if you ignore the Electoral College, and Senate seat allocations, sure.
    - rootusrootus 6y ago
      I mean at the voter level. How it gets expressed in power is certainly an artifact of our political system. For better or worse, our system is tilted towards rural power.
  - dfxm12 6y ago
    Look at Texas' 2nd congressional district [0]. Gerrymandered districts are a more defining characteristic for red/blue (as is the electoral college). 0 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas%27s_2nd_congressional_district https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas%27s_2nd_congressional_di...
    - jofer 6y ago
      I live in this district. Supposedly, I have more in common with folks 50 miles away in Kingwood than I do with the folks two streets over. It's BS and leads to Crenshaw getting elected (who I didn't like but at least respected at the beginning of his term, but really kinda do hate now). There is a bit more than just the usual gerrymandering at play here, though. Notice where the southern tip of the district is. The med center is deliberately split between (almost) every congressional district in Houston. That means that it gets multiple representatives in congress from multiple parties and remains well-funded. That's actually not a bad strategy, but it unfortunately gives the Republican state legislature a justification to hide behind for their blatant gerrymandering. It's also why the current configuration isn't likely to change dramatically. Both parties want to ensure that the TX Medical Center has lots of representation in congress. As a result, Houston's core will always be divided among multiple districts. Republicans control the state legislature, so they make the districts have big "blobs" from outside the city, but if it were drawn by the democrats, it would still have this weird tendency to have narrow "arms" reaching towards the med center.
  - anonymouse008 6y ago
    You nailed it. The difference between cultures in rural, suburban, and urban is mainly due to environmental stimulus. When your only opportunity for food at ~9pm in a rural/suburban environment is fast food — that changes the way you view your day, becoming a defacto framework that permeates everything. They think in terms of independence and consequence (sound red?) - work late and still want decent sleep? Well you have to eat McDonalds or make a turkey sandwhich, there is no luxury, no option of a small family restaurant sharing their homeland cuisine. This makes for a peculiar set of people - people that are mad good at creativity within limitations, but are constantly defined by their lack of exposure to experiences and post-modern cultural poverty.
    - ghaff 6y ago
      >When your only opportunity for food at ~9pm in a rural/suburban environment is fast food — that changes the way you view your day, becoming a defacto framework that permeates everything. I pretty strongly disagree with this. Most people make meals at home which aren't necessarily "just a turkey sandwich." I don't even live in a particularly rural area (about 40 miles west of Boston) and I don't really have great meal options at 5pm much less 9pm. There are a few good pizza places, a Five Guys, some chain steak places, etc. but other than the odd pizza takeout I don't really eat out. If I lived in a city? I'd probably go out or get takeout more regularly but I'd still cook most days.
      - anonymouse008 6y ago
        I debated fully fleshing out this topic and decided to stick to a high level until someone replied - so thank you for the critique. The turkey sandwhich was meant to be a place holder for the general idea. Roughly, if you want to work long and hard to get ahead, usually food prep time is the easiest thing to cut to get a return on time invested in long term value. There are still super humans that have mastered meal prep (this may be you) but for the people I know, it’s hard to do all of these things well with limited options - which forces this consequence mindset.
        ghaff 6y ago
  - samizdis 6y ago
    Indeed, and I'd read many articles over the past few years pointing that out. Being a bit of a nerd, though, it was brought home to me most vividly by an NYT article in September, which uses aerial image analysis - roughly speaking grey v green, but with the most interesting bits in between: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/09/02/upshot/america-political-spectrum.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/09/02/upshot/americ...
  - Balgair 6y ago
    Each state is unique and changing in time. Look at CO for example. Focus on the Family, the USAF Academy and many military bases are all in CO. 20 years ago, it was a solid Rep. base. But over time, things have shifted so that weed first became legal there. That's ignoring the major issue that all western states have: water rights. All the pish-posh of politics today has nothing on the fights over water in western states. In CO that pits the mountains against the ranchers, in CA that pits north against south; there is no red/blue when it comes to the real (and sometimes deadly) fight over water.
- hindsightbias 6y ago
  Texas was strongly democratic until a lot of folks from the Bible Belt watched too much Dallas on TV and moved in. The demos have to change a lot in a lot of districts to overcome Gerrymandering for state and federal House representatives. Power isn't in the Governorship, the Lt. Governor controls the state Senate, budget and sits on the redistricting commission. They are elected from the state Senate members. So TX could have a Democratic Governor and Senators but the local stuff will be red for a long time.
  - AuthorizedCust 6y ago
    > They are elected from the state Senate members. In context, I think your "they" refers to the lieutenant governor? That position is elected by the people of Texas, not (state) senators.
  - kthejoker2 6y ago
    By "local stuff" I guess you mean small rural counties? All of Texas' major cities vote blue.
    - clavalle 6y ago
      Not all. Lubbock and Ft. Worth are red through and through.
      - kodablah 6y ago
        Fort Worth (or Tarrant county maybe, I forget) majority voted for a democratic president for the first time in a long time. Demographics are slowly shifting there (and for those looking for that old Austin feel, it has a lot of it these days).
      - SirLuxuryYacht 6y ago
        If you define blue/red by the presidential vote, then the parent is correct. Every major city voted biden this cycle.
    - hindsightbias 6y ago
- mbesto 6y ago
  > remains a strongly Republican state in the future Texas is already pretty purple. Dallas/Houston/Austin are all very blue and growing like crazy.
- base698 6y ago
  What makes you think it's red or blue that's leaving? California is still 40% republican after all. Granted there are lots of reasons both would move like the needles and shit in the street. I feel on the political side it would be more likely for the reds to leave.
  - throwaway0a5e 6y ago
    People living in strongly red or blue states are going to be more used to the dominant party's stupidity. It's not about the specific party policy points as it is about being blind to everything your party does wrong. A "red" Californian transplant in some other state is more likely to vote for some insane leftist who wants to turn the economy inside out because they like their policy on police reform and they are blind to all of the things that should be red flags because those things are within the realm of normal back home. And the same goes for a blue transplant from the reddest parts of the bible belt. They're more likely to vote for some insane moralizing right winger because they support legal weed despite having beliefs about homosexuals that are straight out of the 1980s (or whatever, I'm just making up somewhat realistic examples). IMO the worst part is that both groups don't realize that the rampant ineffectiveness, corruption, back room dealing and bad treatment of the populace that governments in both red and blue states indulge in when they don't have to fear being voted out isn't something that's normal or something that should be tolerated. If you live in a single party dump of a state you're eventually gonna stop smelling the dump.
  - giardini 6y ago
    base698 says:"> I feel on the political side it would be more likely for the reds to leave.<" b/c reds are the only ones who have the money to relocate.
- AaronM 6y ago
  In the 2016 Senate election, more California transplants voted for Cruz over Beto. https://www.ktsa.com/abbott-larger-percentage-of-california-transplants-supported-cruz-in-2018-than-native-texans/ https://www.ktsa.com/abbott-larger-percentage-of-california-...
whimsicalism 6y ago
Sorry, you're suggesting there's the same level of technical talent in ATX as in the Bay?
- igetspam 6y ago
  Define "level." Is there the same caliber of talent? Absolutely. Are there an equal number? Not even close. Is the ratio of tech to non tech in the ATX area the same as the bay area? Probably not but it's growing. More and more of the people I've met here are in tech. This has continued to go up as more subdivisions are completed. The new tax laws that screwed over CA residents have definitely increased the number of CA migrants, as has the the increase in remote work from COVID. We have fast internet, no state tax and cheaper property. (What you get for half million here vs CA is amazing and it's nowhere near as nice as it was just five years ago). Added bonus and what nobody here will tell you (and TX natives don't see) is that the Hill Country is absolutely beautiful. I was shocked when I moves here. I didn't know it but it's a huge wedding destination because it's so pretty. (Being in CA leaves an ignorant taste in your mouth about TX). So no, it's not the bay area and we don't have parity right noq. As a bay area native, I would never go back. (Full disclosure: TX will get better than it is now but not that I'm a parent of a toddler, we're probably leaving and headed to New England. That's a discussion for a different topic though.)
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - Dracophoenix 6y ago
    Why the move to New England?
asiachick 6y ago
I don't know what criteria is being used to claim Texas is American's most diverse city but simple checking the census data shows that is provably false. ALSO, WTF is up with the whole mixing in Hispanic in such a strange way in the census? Seems super fishy like someone wanted to paint a certain kind of picture but if they just plainly list ethnicities they don't get to make the story they want to tell.
- SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
  It’s handled that way because many Hispanic people don’t consider “Hispanic” to be a race. That is to say, Afro-Latinos and White Hispanic people often don’t consider ourselves multiracial; my racial heritage is independent of the fact that my ancestors happened to be located in Mexico at one point.
  - lupire 6y ago
    What's a racial heritage though? Appalachians don't have the same racial heritage as more recent family immigrants from Russia or Ireland, but all are Caucasian, and Black descendants of slaves don't have the same racial heritage as Somali or Kenyan immigrants.
- whimsicalism 6y ago
  The DC area, for instance, seems obviously more diverse than Houston.
  - kthejoker2 6y ago
    "Obviously" in what way? Houston's population is 25% foreign born, with an almost even 4-way split between Black, Asian, Hispanic, and White residents. We're also more socioeconomically balanced and diverse. https://wallethub.com/edu/most-diverse-cities/12690#detailed https://wallethub.com/edu/most-diverse-cities/12690#detailed
    - letitbeirie 6y ago
mapgrep 6y ago
As an ex Texan, I understand the pride behind this statement. But I think what seems to be the underlying premise — we don’t need to change to attract outsiders - captures an essential historic difference between California and Texas culture. It’s dangerous to speak too broadly — california has had its reactionary periods - but on balance I find it historically much more eager to change and evolve, especially socially, in response to outside and unconventional ideas and people. The Bay Area in particular (a tech center) is famous for this. Yes Texas is demographically changing rapidly but the culture of a place changes relatively slowly.

ryder9 6y ago

lmao

aNoob7000 6y ago

I'm not trying to make this political, but with all the migration to Texas it will be interesting to see if it remains a strongly Republican state in the future. I live in Georgia and I can see the demographics changing quite a lot.

rootusrootus 6y ago
IMO the idea of red states and blue states doesn't make a lot of sense. Remove the state boundaries and the real defining characteristic for red/blue is urban/rural. It need not be any more complicated than that.
- hindsightbias 6y ago
  In TX it is more complicated. The cities and farms were blue until all those folks from out-of-state moved into new suburbs and retired to exurbs. The suburbs have controlled TX for about 30 years. What's left of real rural folk doesn't matter except in the local statehouse.
- api 6y ago
  It’s a shocking almost perfect correlation, and it’s intensifying. The suburbs are starting to turn blue, especially around large cities, leaving the Republican Party an almost pure rural party.
- pc86 6y ago
  I mean, if you ignore the Electoral College, and Senate seat allocations, sure.
  - rootusrootus 6y ago
    I mean at the voter level. How it gets expressed in power is certainly an artifact of our political system. For better or worse, our system is tilted towards rural power.
- dfxm12 6y ago
  Look at Texas' 2nd congressional district [0]. Gerrymandered districts are a more defining characteristic for red/blue (as is the electoral college). 0 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas%27s_2nd_congressional_district https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas%27s_2nd_congressional_di...
  - jofer 6y ago
    I live in this district. Supposedly, I have more in common with folks 50 miles away in Kingwood than I do with the folks two streets over. It's BS and leads to Crenshaw getting elected (who I didn't like but at least respected at the beginning of his term, but really kinda do hate now). There is a bit more than just the usual gerrymandering at play here, though. Notice where the southern tip of the district is. The med center is deliberately split between (almost) every congressional district in Houston. That means that it gets multiple representatives in congress from multiple parties and remains well-funded. That's actually not a bad strategy, but it unfortunately gives the Republican state legislature a justification to hide behind for their blatant gerrymandering. It's also why the current configuration isn't likely to change dramatically. Both parties want to ensure that the TX Medical Center has lots of representation in congress. As a result, Houston's core will always be divided among multiple districts. Republicans control the state legislature, so they make the districts have big "blobs" from outside the city, but if it were drawn by the democrats, it would still have this weird tendency to have narrow "arms" reaching towards the med center.
- anonymouse008 6y ago
  You nailed it. The difference between cultures in rural, suburban, and urban is mainly due to environmental stimulus. When your only opportunity for food at ~9pm in a rural/suburban environment is fast food — that changes the way you view your day, becoming a defacto framework that permeates everything. They think in terms of independence and consequence (sound red?) - work late and still want decent sleep? Well you have to eat McDonalds or make a turkey sandwhich, there is no luxury, no option of a small family restaurant sharing their homeland cuisine. This makes for a peculiar set of people - people that are mad good at creativity within limitations, but are constantly defined by their lack of exposure to experiences and post-modern cultural poverty.
  - ghaff 6y ago
    >When your only opportunity for food at ~9pm in a rural/suburban environment is fast food — that changes the way you view your day, becoming a defacto framework that permeates everything. I pretty strongly disagree with this. Most people make meals at home which aren't necessarily "just a turkey sandwich." I don't even live in a particularly rural area (about 40 miles west of Boston) and I don't really have great meal options at 5pm much less 9pm. There are a few good pizza places, a Five Guys, some chain steak places, etc. but other than the odd pizza takeout I don't really eat out. If I lived in a city? I'd probably go out or get takeout more regularly but I'd still cook most days.
    - anonymouse008 6y ago
      I debated fully fleshing out this topic and decided to stick to a high level until someone replied - so thank you for the critique. The turkey sandwhich was meant to be a place holder for the general idea. Roughly, if you want to work long and hard to get ahead, usually food prep time is the easiest thing to cut to get a return on time invested in long term value. There are still super humans that have mastered meal prep (this may be you) but for the people I know, it’s hard to do all of these things well with limited options - which forces this consequence mindset.
      - ghaff 6y ago
- samizdis 6y ago
  Indeed, and I'd read many articles over the past few years pointing that out. Being a bit of a nerd, though, it was brought home to me most vividly by an NYT article in September, which uses aerial image analysis - roughly speaking grey v green, but with the most interesting bits in between: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/09/02/upshot/america-political-spectrum.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/09/02/upshot/americ...
- Balgair 6y ago
  Each state is unique and changing in time. Look at CO for example. Focus on the Family, the USAF Academy and many military bases are all in CO. 20 years ago, it was a solid Rep. base. But over time, things have shifted so that weed first became legal there. That's ignoring the major issue that all western states have: water rights. All the pish-posh of politics today has nothing on the fights over water in western states. In CO that pits the mountains against the ranchers, in CA that pits north against south; there is no red/blue when it comes to the real (and sometimes deadly) fight over water.
hindsightbias 6y ago
Texas was strongly democratic until a lot of folks from the Bible Belt watched too much Dallas on TV and moved in. The demos have to change a lot in a lot of districts to overcome Gerrymandering for state and federal House representatives. Power isn't in the Governorship, the Lt. Governor controls the state Senate, budget and sits on the redistricting commission. They are elected from the state Senate members. So TX could have a Democratic Governor and Senators but the local stuff will be red for a long time.
- AuthorizedCust 6y ago
  > They are elected from the state Senate members. In context, I think your "they" refers to the lieutenant governor? That position is elected by the people of Texas, not (state) senators.
- kthejoker2 6y ago
  By "local stuff" I guess you mean small rural counties? All of Texas' major cities vote blue.
  - clavalle 6y ago
    Not all. Lubbock and Ft. Worth are red through and through.
    - kodablah 6y ago
      Fort Worth (or Tarrant county maybe, I forget) majority voted for a democratic president for the first time in a long time. Demographics are slowly shifting there (and for those looking for that old Austin feel, it has a lot of it these days).
    - SirLuxuryYacht 6y ago
      If you define blue/red by the presidential vote, then the parent is correct. Every major city voted biden this cycle.
  - hindsightbias 6y ago
mbesto 6y ago
> remains a strongly Republican state in the future Texas is already pretty purple. Dallas/Houston/Austin are all very blue and growing like crazy.
base698 6y ago
What makes you think it's red or blue that's leaving? California is still 40% republican after all. Granted there are lots of reasons both would move like the needles and shit in the street. I feel on the political side it would be more likely for the reds to leave.
- throwaway0a5e 6y ago
  People living in strongly red or blue states are going to be more used to the dominant party's stupidity. It's not about the specific party policy points as it is about being blind to everything your party does wrong. A "red" Californian transplant in some other state is more likely to vote for some insane leftist who wants to turn the economy inside out because they like their policy on police reform and they are blind to all of the things that should be red flags because those things are within the realm of normal back home. And the same goes for a blue transplant from the reddest parts of the bible belt. They're more likely to vote for some insane moralizing right winger because they support legal weed despite having beliefs about homosexuals that are straight out of the 1980s (or whatever, I'm just making up somewhat realistic examples). IMO the worst part is that both groups don't realize that the rampant ineffectiveness, corruption, back room dealing and bad treatment of the populace that governments in both red and blue states indulge in when they don't have to fear being voted out isn't something that's normal or something that should be tolerated. If you live in a single party dump of a state you're eventually gonna stop smelling the dump.
- giardini 6y ago
  base698 says:"> I feel on the political side it would be more likely for the reds to leave.<" b/c reds are the only ones who have the money to relocate.
AaronM 6y ago
In the 2016 Senate election, more California transplants voted for Cruz over Beto. https://www.ktsa.com/abbott-larger-percentage-of-california-transplants-supported-cruz-in-2018-than-native-texans/ https://www.ktsa.com/abbott-larger-percentage-of-california-...

whimsicalism 6y ago

Sorry, you're suggesting there's the same level of technical talent in ATX as in the Bay?

igetspam 6y ago
Define "level." Is there the same caliber of talent? Absolutely. Are there an equal number? Not even close. Is the ratio of tech to non tech in the ATX area the same as the bay area? Probably not but it's growing. More and more of the people I've met here are in tech. This has continued to go up as more subdivisions are completed. The new tax laws that screwed over CA residents have definitely increased the number of CA migrants, as has the the increase in remote work from COVID. We have fast internet, no state tax and cheaper property. (What you get for half million here vs CA is amazing and it's nowhere near as nice as it was just five years ago). Added bonus and what nobody here will tell you (and TX natives don't see) is that the Hill Country is absolutely beautiful. I was shocked when I moves here. I didn't know it but it's a huge wedding destination because it's so pretty. (Being in CA leaves an ignorant taste in your mouth about TX). So no, it's not the bay area and we don't have parity right noq. As a bay area native, I would never go back. (Full disclosure: TX will get better than it is now but not that I'm a parent of a toddler, we're probably leaving and headed to New England. That's a discussion for a different topic though.)
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- Dracophoenix 6y ago
  Why the move to New England?

asiachick 6y ago

I don't know what criteria is being used to claim Texas is American's most diverse city but simple checking the census data shows that is provably false. ALSO, WTF is up with the whole mixing in Hispanic in such a strange way in the census? Seems super fishy like someone wanted to paint a certain kind of picture but if they just plainly list ethnicities they don't get to make the story they want to tell.

SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
It’s handled that way because many Hispanic people don’t consider “Hispanic” to be a race. That is to say, Afro-Latinos and White Hispanic people often don’t consider ourselves multiracial; my racial heritage is independent of the fact that my ancestors happened to be located in Mexico at one point.
- lupire 6y ago
  What's a racial heritage though? Appalachians don't have the same racial heritage as more recent family immigrants from Russia or Ireland, but all are Caucasian, and Black descendants of slaves don't have the same racial heritage as Somali or Kenyan immigrants.
whimsicalism 6y ago
The DC area, for instance, seems obviously more diverse than Houston.
- kthejoker2 6y ago
  "Obviously" in what way? Houston's population is 25% foreign born, with an almost even 4-way split between Black, Asian, Hispanic, and White residents. We're also more socioeconomically balanced and diverse. https://wallethub.com/edu/most-diverse-cities/12690#detailed https://wallethub.com/edu/most-diverse-cities/12690#detailed
  - letitbeirie 6y ago

mapgrep 6y ago

As an ex Texan, I understand the pride behind this statement. But I think what seems to be the underlying premise — we don’t need to change to attract outsiders - captures an essential historic difference between California and Texas culture. It’s dangerous to speak too broadly — california has had its reactionary periods - but on balance I find it historically much more eager to change and evolve, especially socially, in response to outside and unconventional ideas and people. The Bay Area in particular (a tech center) is famous for this. Yes Texas is demographically changing rapidly but the culture of a place changes relatively slowly.