LIBERALS, LIKE A SWARM OF LOCUST…

As liberals flee the respective messes that they themselves helped to create, the net result has been that three Democrat-leaning states have hemorrhaged hundreds of thousands of people in 2016 and 2017 because crime and high taxes had residents seeking greener pastures elsewhere.  And it’s these locusts set loose upon our nation that upon arrival at their chosen destination soon set about turning those red states they settle in, blue.  These liberals never learn. They destroy their liberal Blue states and then move on to various Red states and proceed to destroy them.

The exodus of residents was most pronounced in New York, which saw about 190,000 people leave the state between July 1, 2016 and July 1, 2017, that according to the U.S. Census Bureau data released just last week.  New York’s domestic out-migration during that time period was about the same as it was in the same time 2015 and 2016. Since 2010, the state’s outflow of just over 1 million residents has exceeded that of every other state, both in absolute terms and as a share of population, according to some ‘free-market’ think tank that calls itself the Empire Center.

And yet despite the massive domestic out-migration flow, New York’s net population actually grew slightly, largely due to high levels of international immigration and a so-called “natural increase” — that being the difference between births and deaths in a given year.  New York’s net migration was about minus 60,000 residents, but the state had 73,000 more births than deaths, resulting in a net population growth of about 13,000.  A onetime New York resident myself, it was upon retirement from the military that there was simply no way I was going back to New York. 

Illinois, on the other hand, has not been so fortunate. Long-beset by twin budget and pension crises and the erosion of its tax base, Illinois lost so many residents that it dropped from the fifth to the sixth-most populous state in 2017.  Just under 115,000 Illinois residents decamped for other states between July 2016 and July 2017.  Since 2010, the Land of Lincoln has lost about 650,000 residents to other states on net, equal to the combined population of the state’s four largest cities other than Chicago, and that would be according to the Illinois Policy Institute.

Illinois’ domestic out-migration problem has become a nightmare for lawmakers, who must find a way to solve the worst pension crisis in the nation as the state’s tax base continues to shrink year after year.  Illinois’ Democrat-dominated legislature has only made a bad situation worse with numerous tax hikes, causing even more people to leave and throwing the state into a demographic death spiral spiral. Illinois experienced a net loss of about 33,000 residents in 2016, the fourth consecutive year of population decline.  And yet leaders refuse to do anything to stop the bleeding. 

And it was Orphe Divounguy, someone billed as the ‘chief economist’ with the Illinois Policy Institute, who said, “As people leave the state, they take their pocketbooks with them. That means there are fewer Illinoisans to pay the bills.” He went on to say, “It’s worrying because if you have a declining population and a declining labor force, you will for sure have a further slowdown of economic activity going into 2018.”  I’d like to ask this supposed ‘chief economist’ on what, or who, it is that he places the blame?  His reply would likely be nothing but more liberal drivel. 

And it was, of course, California that was the third deep blue state to experience significant domestic out-migration between July 2016 and July 2017, and it couldn’t blame the outflow on retirees searching for a more agreeable climate.  About 138,000 residents left the state during that time period, second only to New York.  However, because California was the top receiving state for international migrants, its net migration was actually 27,000.  Add to that number a “natural increase” of 214,000 people, and California’s population grew by about just over 240,000.

Going forward, one factor that could worsen domestic out-migration from New York, California and Illinois is the newly-enacted tax reform bill, which caps state and local tax (SALT) deductions at $10,000.  The limit on SALT deduction is poised to hit taxpayers harder in those states than it will in just about any other.  According to the Tax Foundation, New York, Illinois and California had three of the five highest tax rates expressed as a percentage of per capita income, with residents paying 12.7 percent, 11 percent and 11 percent, respectively. 

Another analogy that would seem to fit whenever discussing Liberalism is that it has come to resemble the very worst form of cancer.  Because it metastasizes out from an initial or primary site to different or secondary sites within the host's body. Liberalism can also be defined as being the persistence of human beings failing to achieve a certain result, and then once again making the same attempt in another location, expecting there to be a different outcome.  And it’s those who support this failed ideology that now represents the greatest threat we face.

Ultimately it’s these three states that represent the Blue that so many lefties are very proud of, and that is, in reality, responsible for running up all manner of social spending on the backs of those who choose to remain behind.  They hate where they live, so they move to someplace new, infect it with what is their toxic ideology, and demand that the new host change to make it more like the place they just left. They are an infestation of the worst kind.  And while we may welcome them in we must also work to prevent them from turning us into what it was they left behind.