Posts Tagged ‘population’

A Quick Look At Texas Migration Patterns

Thursday, October 2nd, 2014

Will Franklin of WILLisms put up an interesting link on his Twitter feed: A PDF of Texas relocation data from the Texas Association of Realtors.

There’s lots of interesting information to be gleaned:

The 2014 Texas Relocation Report shows that Texas continues to be a national leader in relocation activity and a sought- after location for households moving out of state.

According to the report, Texas gained more out-of-state residents than any other state in 2013, with 584,034 people moving to Texas from out of state. A majority of these residents originated from California (66,318), followed by Florida (32,619), Oklahoma (29,169), Louisiana (29,042), and Illinois (28,900).

Texas ranked third in the nation for number of residents moving out of state in 2013 (409,977), coming in behind California (581,689) and Florida (423,995) and topping New York (401,440), and Illinois (304,674). Like with incoming residents, a majority of the residents who moved out of state moved to California (32,290), followed by Oklahoma (27,391), Florida (24,226), Colorado (23,490), and Louisiana (21,747).

Overall, Texas had a net gain of out-of-state residents in 2013, with 138,057 more people moving into Texas than Texas residents moving out of state in 2013.

So roughly twice as many people moved from California to Texas as vice versa.

Other nuggets from the report:

  • Both Harris and Dallas counties had net negative outflows, though their surrounding counties more than made up for it in population growth.
  • Williamson county had the third largest net population inflow, with Hays fourth, behind Denton and Brazos counties, but well ahead of Travis. Indeed, Williamson’s population growth was three times that of Travis.
  • Despite that, Travis got more out-of-state migration inflow than Williamson, which I take to mean that Travis got more Californians and Williamson got more Texans fleeing The People’s Republic of Austin.
  • If you scroll all the way to the bottom of the report, it actually says most of Williamson’s in-state inflow came from Travis, but numbers of people moving from Williamson to Travis are so low they’re not even in the the top five. Indeed, more people moved to Walker County (home to Huntsville) than to Travis.
  • What does this mean politically? As Ace of Spades noted in their ginormous .PNG, conservative areas of the state are gaining population, while liberal strongholds are losing ground. The two largest liberal counties (Bexar and Travis) to gain population were outpaced by population growth in conservative Denton County alone.

    Conclusion: Despite Democrats talking up demographic shifts, don’t expect Texas to turn blue anytime soon…

    Barry Smitherman Is Not Helping Himself

    Tuesday, September 10th, 2013

    In the last two weeks, Barry Smitherman has put his foot in it twice, committing unforced errors in his quest to move up from the Railroad Commission to the Attorney General’s office.

    First, he said that America’s low birth-rate was a long-term threat to the nation and that many aborted babies “would have voted Republican.”

    The first assertion is plausible (albeit a long-term concern), but very far indeed from the purvey of the Texas Attorney General. The second statement, in addition to being statistically dubious (minorities tend to both have abortions and vote Democratic at a much higher rate than whites), is offensive because it takes a profound moral issue and trivializes it by turning it into a partisan issue.

    Smitherman could easily have avoided the problem by merely stating “I am strongly Pro-Life, and as Attorney General I will protect the unborn and defend Texas laws restricting abortion.” This is a plausible, principled, focused response that presents a much smaller attack surface for the opposition.

    As if shooting himself in the foot wasn’t sufficient, Smitherman promptly took his gun out of the holster again, took aim, and shot himself in the other foot, stating:

    “We are uniquely situated because we have energy resources, fossil and otherwise, and our own independent electrical grid. Generally speaking, we have made great progress in becoming an independent nation, an ‘island nation’ if you will, and I think we want to continue down that path so that if the rest of the country falls apart, Texas can operate as a stand-alone entity with energy, food, water and roads as if we were a closed-loop system.”

    With just a little editing, Smitherman could have sounded far-sighted rather than kooky, emphasizing keeping Texas prosperous, and our infrastructure working, no matter the challenges or difficulties in the rest of the nation. However, when you start speaking of “an independent nation,” then you’ve stopped making sense and started to play footsie with the “Secede!” kooks.

    As a science fiction writer, I can spin a number of vaguely plausible (but unlikely) scenarios in which Texas might secede from the United States. Hell, I can even think of situations where I might push for such action myself (if the feds abolished private property and civilian firearms ownership, I’d be headed for the barricades). What all those scenarios have in common is that none of them are particularly likely, certainly not in the short term, and probably not in the medium term even. (And good freaking luck “seceding” from hyperinflation, a far more likely “doomsday” scenario than any which result in Texas becoming its own country again.)

    Look, I’m a native Texan. I’m proud of the state’s heritage as an independent nation, and do believe that (if we had to) Texas could succeed and thrive as an independent nation. But talk about secession (and the “War of Northern Aggression”) is only get a rise out of the yankees, and no one who takes it seriously should be holding statewide elective office. The United States of America will survive Obama, and there’s a difference between prepping and conspiratorial doomsday mongering. (And “closed-loop” economic autarky is loser economics.)

    Moreover, even in that extremely unlikely scenario, I fail to see how the Attorney General of Texas would have a leading role in such preparations. The fact that Smitherman brought it up suggests (again) that he lacks the focus and message discipline necessary to be Attorney General.

    Texas to Gain Four House Seats in Redistricting

    Tuesday, December 21st, 2010

    The census data has finally been released, and Texas will gain four seats in the U.S. House. (Here’s a map breaking down which districts have gained or lost population, and by how much.) Keep in mind that at least one or two of those seats will have to be “majority minority” Hispanic seats to comply with the Voting Rights Act.

    The only other state to gain more than one House seat was Florida, which gained two. Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, South Carolina, Utah and Washington state each gained one.

    Ohio and New York will each lose two seats, while Illinois, Iowa, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania will each lose one.

    The total U.S. population is now 308,745,538, a 9.7% increase from 2000.

    The states gaining seats are predominately Republican, while the states losing seats are predominately Democratic, a trend that’s been going on since at least the 1980s. This, along with newly Republican majorities in many of the statehouses that will control redistricting, is the reason some analysts believe that Republicans will control the House at least through 2012, and possibly beyond.