Ryan Streeter
The Census data released today is widely reported as good news for the Republican party - and it is. But in a way slightly different than most are reporting.
Most news reports of the Census’s reapportionment of congressional seats have focused on how the American population is moving south and west to red states, which is good for the GOP. Texas gained four seats, Florida gained two, and Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, South Carolina, Utah and Washington all gained one. Meanwhile, New York and Ohio each lost two seats, and Illinois, Iowa, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania all lost one.
This is indeed a good news story for the GOP politically, but it’s an even more important policy story for the GOP. People generally do not move from one state to another because they prefer the politics of the party in power, and climate alone can’t explain the western and southern trajectory of U.S. migration. California, after all, has been losing population (though it was spared a lost seat, a possibility many had been predicting). Movement is not random and without explanation, however.
People and businesses head to places that have a good quality of life, reasonable cost of living, the prospect of upward mobility, and the best chance of growing new enterprises. The states that have gained the most seats are the ones that, in general, have the best policy environments: favorable taxes, lower costs of doing business, good infrastructure, and less expensive public sectors.
On November 2, American voted overwhelmingly for Washington to spend less and get its house in order. But for the past ten years, Americans have been voting with their feet for a broader policy portfolio of lower taxes, good government, and pro-enterprise rules and regulations that Republicans typically advocate. One can argue that the 2010 mid-terms delivered a fairly straightforward, singular message about spending. The Census report, on the other hand, reflects a collective vote by Americans for pro-growth policies that are good for families and businesses.
In the Enterprising States report produced this year by the Praxis Strategy Group for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Florida, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, Georgia, and Washington are all in the report’s list of the top ten infrastructure performers. The only state to lose a congressional seat in the top ten is Illinois. In fact, in the reports multiple ranking sets by growth, taxation, innovation, and so on, the states that lost congressional seats today are largely absent.
Or when we look at Beacon Hill’s 2010 State Competitiveness Index, Florida and Nevada top the rankings for sound government and fiscal policy, while New Jersey ranks last, New York 46th, and Pennsylvania 44th. In fact, the states gaining seats trend toward the top 20 states in this ranking, and the states losing seats trend toward the bottom 20 states.
By almost any index or metric, the results are clear. Americans do not like living in places with high taxes, dysfunctional and expensive public sectors, and low or negative growth. Being in or close to exciting urban centers or wine regions is not enough of a magnet to keep families and businesses in the neighborhood. People are looking for “opportunity environments” more than anything the left thinks of as appealing.
The Democratic party has virtually no narrative to help it reverse this trend. Its green left wing and its public sector patrons make it almost impossible for the party to talk coherently and persuasively about growth and opportunity. Republicans, on the other hand, have virtually no internal conflict with promoting the lessons contained in the 2010 Census.
Republicans have a history of looking to the states as “laboratories of democracy” to inform federal policymaking. No time is better than now for Republicans to build upon what the states are teaching us about tax policy, regulatory policy, human capital formation, and infrastructure investment. If the GOP succeeds on this front, it could be another good ten years.
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