You’re absolutely right that lots of people would move because of a gun ban. But I feel like that’s a wholly political move, while moving out of somewhere because of some sort of imminent threat to your well-being or essential legal status is something else entirely.
Moving for guns is exactly what I’d count as “moving to be around people who are politically just like you”, while moving because you’re LGBTQ and feel threatened is a very different situation. It’s the difference between moving somewhere because you want to BE THERE, versus moving because you don’t want to BE HERE.
Private polling done by individuals and not done by those with a public track record are neither relevant nor what anyone else is talking about. What’s being discussed are real polls.
Not sure I agree. Lots of people who own guns believe they’re essential for defense of their homes, cars, businesses, families, selves, etc. So a gun ban would feel like an imminent threat to their well-being.
Note: I think gun owners massively overestimate the threats against which they own guns. But their desire to live in a place where guns are permitted is no more “political” than a trans person wanting to live where LGBTQ people are accepted.
Fair enough, I suppose I’m looking at it from the non-paranoid gun owner perspective. I don’t feel threatened in my daily life at all, and the guns I have are ones I inherited and/or were purchased for sporting purposes like hunting or target shooting.
I’d be annoyed if I had to give them up, and I’d be PISSED if I wasn’t compensated fairly for them. But it wouldn’t be the sort of thing that would make me move to keep them.
As opposed to some ex-friends of mine who now live in Arizona, where they carry full-time in public because “we’re right next to Mexico.” It’s about 300 miles to the border, but …
I agree. I think of a lack of state income tax being a political decision with economic consequences, but that’s more of a disagreement of definitions than about what’s actually going on.
I do disagree with the premise of the OP, meaning I don’t think a lot of Democratic voters are leaving Florida and Texas. In the most recent reapportionment, Texas and Florida both gained seats while New York and California both lost. The movement is from blue to red states, even among groups that traditionally vote Democratic. And yes, it’s mostly economic (although IMHO those economic causes are due to political decisions).
Here’s an article about this very issue, discussing why Black people are moving from blue states to red rates.
The people who live in Florida are not going to move to California under almost any circumstance. The other way around is true too. Whether it be politics, housing, weather or culture, they don’t cross over at all.
My family is in the Chicago area. Immediate family is pretty much straight-ticket Democratic voters. One of my sisters is moving to Arizona, another sister is moving to Florida, and my brother is also moving to Florida. I guess some people love warm weather more than they hate living under Republican leadership.
