Hot weather, fire ants, scorpions, rattlesnakes, hurricanes, and run by rednecks. The only redeeming thing about Texas is that it isn’t Mississippi.
7 US states have no income taxes.
- Wyoming.
- Washington.
- Texas.
- South Dakota.
- Nevada.
- Florida.
- Alaska.
2 of them you couldn’t pay me enough to live in - Florida and Texas.
There’s plenty enough threads on the Board already shitting on Texas (including one I started in the Pit). As a long-time Texan, all I can say to those considering whether to move here is that this is an incredibly diverse state and you can find pretty much any living situation that you would find in any other state – downtown glitz vs suburban sprawl vs small town living, liberal oases and conservative bastions, etc. Texas is easy to stereotype, but at least it isn’t a syrup-covered, perenially-autumnal socialist wasteland like Vermont. 
Nope. Just…no.
My mother was from Texas, and I have friends and relatives all over the state. It would take Jeff Bezos money to get me to move there, and even then I’d spend every possible millisecond someplace else. I’d fly in for BBQ, then leave before I spent another cent in the state. No state income tax is about as important to me as valet parking at McDonalds. I like paying taxes. With them I buy civilization.*
If the state ever becomes civilized and they’ve hung the right people from the lamp posts, I might reconsider. But probably not.
-
- Thank you Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
That is only an advantage for those on the upper half of the socio-economic ladder. No state taxes means a poor safety social net. If you’re on the bottom half of the SE ladder you might want more of a social safety net even if that means state taxes.
Oh! I’ll say something good about Texas: while the sales tax is huge (anywhere from 6.25% to 8.25%), food is exempt. That still means a problem for poorer people buying paper goods, but it could be worse.
It’s never too late to learn geography.
Lawdy mercy land of Goshen
Shades of gray out on the ocean
Don’t you dare take that boat out to sea
For the high seas are running
You will sure enough be done in
If you dare take that boat out to sea
Cause out there in the Gulf
The wind is blowing like a bandit
And I’m talking about a hurricane
And your rigging will not stand it
- Asleep at the Wheel
And New Hamster.
I notice that the article’s comments are closed. I responded to the survey that I have different considerations that include human rights.
While in the military, I spent a considerable amount of time at various bases around the state. I can say that there were certainly some extraordinary people and places around Texas, but the diaspora surrounding Dallas was some of the least interesting parts. Not only were some counties “dry” (alcohol banned), but the towns were practically carbon copies of each other. There was almost nothing that distinguished Fort Worth from Arlington, from Irving, from Denton. I honestly cannot think of a single reason I would want to return.
I took the quiz, and it said I should move to San Francisco. Well, at least I could stay in California. I know good people in Texas, but I could never move there. I’m not even a huge fan of BBQ.
Back in 2016, when my wife was panicking about some election results, I told her to take solace in the fact that we at least lived in a state with a Democratic supermajority in the legislature. And, while there’s always things to criticize, I’ve seen my state move to protect abortion access and expand education while watching Texas move to strongly restrict it and go into a tizzy about books that suggest maybe America’s history is a little bit racist. Plus, my lights stay on when it snows.
There’s nothing that would convince me to move to Texas under its current state and it would take a monumental sea change to make me start considering it.
No skiing in Texas.
Pretty sure there is water-skiing in Texas.
No. It is not another form of rape. Words mean things.
Alright - gender, religious, and racially motivated assault upon my autonomy as a person.
All my time in Dallas has been boring. It’s not as bad as Houston, but it’s really drab.
I did not like my two years in Texas but that’s probably colored by my not liking my unit very much and because Fort Hood is Fort Hood. I would prefer the heat to the shitty winter cold I get here.
Not now, not ever. Never.
My only experience of Texas was a week in Austin during a conference, so I can’t pretend to speak to anywhere else. When asked what the weather was like, my stock response was to tell the person to start a load of wet towels in the dryer and go stand in front of the vent. And this was in October.
But the trip was worth it, if for no other reason than to visit the grave of Barbara Jordan* and pay my deepest respects.
* The text of her speech during the Nixon House Impeachment hearings (which is at least as relevant today as it was then) can be found here.