Rob Christensen’s column on Sunday noted that the American Legislative Exchange Council, better known as ALEC, says that North Carolina is now the fourth most competitive state according to its criteria. We follow Utah, North Dakota and Indiana. Have you been to those states? Why in the world would we aspire to be like them?
My in-laws grew up in North Dakota. There’s nothing there. If it weren’t for the gas and oil boom that started a decade or so ago, the place would be deserted. Until the energy folks arrived, people were fleeing the state in droves. As for Indiana, I drive through there a couple of times a year on my way to Minnesota. Aside from Indianapolis, there’s not much attractive. The rest areas are dirty and dilapidated. The secondary roads are full of pot holes. And Utah. The place is so barren, the country gave the whole area to a polygamous religious cult that eventually became modern Mormonism.
On the other end of the ALEC spectrum are New York, Vermont and Minnesota. These least competitive states are destination states. They have great schools, great services, and great quality of life.
I spend several weeks a year in Minnesota and if it weren’t for the winters, it’s the one place I’d consider moving. It’s got the most Fortune 500 companies per capita in the country. It got hit less hard by the recession than most states and it recovered faster. Instead of going the austerity route, they spent money and spent big. It paid off. Their economy has been chugging along and its wages and income is increasing, unlike ours.
For the longest time, the GOP kept pointing to states like South Carolina and Alabama as models for North Carolina. Now, ALEC thinks we should be more like Indiana, North Dakota and Utah. They want North Carolina to become a state with low quality of life, low services, and low wages. I want North Carolina to once again become the state that the rest of the country looks to in admiration.
Thomas Mills is the founder and publisher of PoliticsNC.com. Before beginning PoliticsNC, Thomas spent twenty years as a political and public affairs consultant. Learn more >
A State with a poverty rate of 25 percent that consistently sells its people out as cheap, denies them now the benefits of the ACA, in as much ways, with no conception whatsoever of the difference between ethics and morals. It means the Confederate States of America monuments all throughout the state of NC have done their work. Slavers are somehow made into heroes.
Every time I see a company all excited to buy up parts of NC, it is the predators. Now soon as Atlantic Aero from where was inculcated the fantastic prospects of Honda, the Carlyle Group buys it up.
Luther Hodges couldn’t get Cannon to support the Research Triangle.
The movie industry just uses the state as if it were an attractive garbage dump and leaves as soon as the bribes run out.
Within the State the engineers rivaling MIT at NC State were ignored by Hagen who endorsed the Keystone before renewables engineered from hog wastes.
It is really sad that NC never gets it when it comes to that line, “God bless the child that has its own.” Then these pseudo aristocrats want not the best of what happens in the “incubators” of democracy, the States, but the worst.
I left Indiana after 42 years to come back home to NC. I didn’t know I was coming back to Indiana. Shame!
The only reason north Dakota has a net gain is the oil boom. There are not enough houses, roads or schools to handle the influx. When the oil boom dies, the place will be a ghost town. It’s an outlier.
I must object to your characterization of Utah: it contains stunningly beautiful canyon, the largest chunk of sub-alpine tundra in the lower-48, and lots of great rivers. Of course, it’s thanks only to the federal gov’t that all this is protected, and local governments, no doubt with ALEC’s backing, are doing all they can to ruin all this beauty.
Thomas, there is certainly room for debate about the methodology behind ALEC’s index of state competitiveness. It’s not my favorite. But your line of argument is strange, to say the least. According to the most-recent Census data, New York, Minnesota, and Vermont are the opposite of destination places when it comes to domestic migration. All three lost more people than they gained in 2013. On the other hand, Utah and North Dakota are net-migration gainers — among the highest in the nation in percentage terms — while Indiana’s net-outflow of 1,179 was similar to Minnesota’s (1,147) in the raw data and lower as a percentage of the population (-.018% vs. -.021%).
In other words, huh? Do you mean over a longer period of time? The data don’t appear to support your argument in that case, either. Or do you mean to include immigrants from other countries?
When Bev Perdue left office we had the 5th highest unemployment in the nation and were in the top 10 throughout 2009-2013.
Tarheel Conservative: Your ilk always raises that lame point, conveniently forgetting that, from 2009-2012 the nation was in its worst economic downturn since the Great Depression—a downturn that affected all 50 states, that ramped up and began during the Republican Bush Administration, that was caused by the GOP’s Wall Street and banking friends, and that Gov. Perdue had nothing to do with.
The GOP’s Wall Street? A business location in one of the bluest of states, patronized and protected by the likes of Chuck Schumer, Kirsten Gillebrand, and Andrew Cuomo. Sure. That makes sense. For you trivia lovers….what President signed off on the repeal of Glass-Steagall, a major factor in that worst downturn since the Great Depression?
Really, TY? Are you saying that 8 years of George W. was not a “major factor” in causing the Great Recession? Are you claiming that NC’s high employment 2009-2012 was not a direct outcome of that recession? Are you saying that because Wall Street is located in NY that McConnell, Boehner, and every announced and soon-to-announce GOP presidential candidates don’t curry favor with Wall Street banking and corporate interests?
Nice diversionary change of subject. But no, I’m not saying anything beyond my original post. Merely adding some balance to your rather one-sided focus. Pleased to have been of service.
And as for New York, I lived there for 56 years and can vouch for its very good public schools and public services, and for any individual being able to find the right community that has the quality of life s/he seeks (ranging from the highly urban to the remote and rural).
And unlike NC, which looks like it will have a shortfall of between $150M to $400M to close with its 2015-16 budget, NY is looking at a $5B budget surplus to allocate and invest. And they have that without enacting any supply-side “tax reform.”
And what’s the debate like among the political parties and various major special interest groups in NY as to what to do with that surplus? Most want long-term infrastructural investments in roads, bridges, airports, etc. The governor there also wants a good part devoted to programs that will help the rural and older urban centers well north of New York City (i.e., “Upstate”).
So why is it that decisionmakers/legislators in NY can see the value in long-term public investments that benefit the common good, while NCGOP leaders can’t?