I live in Oakland. You need to get out more if you think city folks in Blue states don’t see the poor.
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Another angle on that is why/how are they becoming more urban. Is the growth simply due to locals wanting a higher paying job, or to move to a more urban area? Or is it in part due to those jobs and location attracting others to relocate to that area. I live in NC and areas like Raleigh/Durham and Charlotte are always marked blue on a per county basis, at the same time these areas also have the lowest ratio of native residents to relocated ones. While I do live in a fairly urban area it has steadily been moving from red toward purple over the years, I find that to be more of a cultural shift of how the younger generation is reacting to the more rigid positions of the current political landscape.
What I’ve seen of Red States with high dependency rates is a resentment among the population for the subsidiaries they do receive from the government. Even though they are dependent on the government just to survive, they’d rather have a job, and they suspect these social programs simply get in the way of that (i.e. If the government taxed the “haves” less, they would hire more “have nots”).
Which is nonsense of course because the “haves” in those states* get insane tax break/corporate handouts etc.
Whelp, the ‘haves’ get em’ in most states sadly. It’s just a matter of degrees…
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i want a pony
So you moved from a poorer Southern town to a rich Northern one and decided that this was typical? I lived most my life on the Northwest side of Chicago. Needless to say, my experiences have been much different… There are plenty of rich areas in The South too. Generally though, I do agree that more progressive states are run better which results in better positive numbers across the board.
Of course we’ll watch Dancing with the Stars – HGTV('s Design) Star was cancelled!
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Okay. It’s time for “blue” states to vote Republican.
Are farm subsidies part of the equation? It might not be all about people on welfare voting against their interests.
No. I have lived in several big cities on the East Coast, Deep South, and some smaller towns. What I notice as a trend is that as I move North there is more segregation of whole populations, less overall poverty generally, and so it is easier to hide it in pockets where wealthy people rarely interact with poor people. In the South, poverty is so pervasive it is harder to hide.
I think population density and climate may have something to do with that. Even in poorer northern states, people can’t physically live on the streets year round. It would definitely kill them. Meanwhile, here in CA, people are out on January nights, still risking death, but with no guarantee of it. Even without the homeless population, you end up with the greatest population on the coasts, and in the far south, because the climate is most desirable.
I should probably also note that Los Angeles County has a high population density (one of the highest in the country), and it doesn’t matter where you are - you will see homeless people on the streets. They have no where else to go - SROs and homeless shelters are completely full.
Here’s current (2014) population density:
Here’s a 2012 plant hardiness map.
Note that people tend to stay where the winters are less harsh, and cluster in mediterranean climates - they allow you to live/work more easily year round. Our country isn’t just “cut in half”. The northern midwest cities actually fall into a warmer zone than those located centrally, and the plains get cut by a cold wind all winter.
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