I moved from MO to IL and never looked back
What a shocking revelation.
I feel really sad for anyone living in those states. People can’t choose where they are born and usually are stuck wherever they end up for at least 18-20 years.
And they are subject to the mental poison endemic to that region. It takes a long time and a lot of effort to purge that evil. I can speak from personal experience. It never goes away and it is a constant struggle to shout down that early indoctrination.
Yeah. I made my comment from personal experience as well. I was lucky and had a friend who got out and helped me by giving me a place to crash so I could as well. I’m fully in support of a fund to help state border jumpers that someone else mentioned in the comments here (even though I’m too poor to contribute) and have tried to pay the karma back by giving others a place to crash like I got.
Don’t believe everything you read. Yes a lot of that is true, but think about your daily life. Do you think all of that stuff really effects who your friends are, things you do with your family, the house you live in? The kind of things that effect your daily life, probably effect it no matter where you live (increased food prices, interest rates, etc.). Plus there’s hope that one day DeSantis will be gone and maybe a lot of those things will turn around. In the mean time…
I freely admit I’m sick of living in Florida, mostly for the reasons in the article and the dreadful heat, yes. But there’s a lot of good in Florida too. We have year round outdoor activities, regular launches into outer space, theme parks, pretty good beaches, no state income tax, lots of sunshine and hey at least were not Mississippi.
Just remember the source and the criteria used to make that judgment. Every place has pluses and minuses.
No state income tax means the richest people scoot by and the poorest pay the biggest share of their income on shitloads of tolls, the highest food prices I’ve ever seen, retail taxes, and insurance costs that would make your asshole pucker up the second the agent spit out the quote
If you have a lot of money and like poor people to suffer super regressive taxes, then it sounds like a fantastic place
Not Mississippi? You’re Mississippi plus tourism and a different name. That’s the difference
Oh and if you want a theme park that is actually fun, Ohio is the way to go
Things that affect my day to day life:
- Doctors literally fleeing the state out of fear of what life saving procedures and prescriptions will become illegal next. I like “extreme sports”. I also like knowing that, if something goes REALLY wrong, I can use my (really nice) health insurance. Same with preventative care to know that that lump in my side is just a fatty deposit and not cancer.
- Teachers flee the state out of fear of what lessons they may teach in class or attempts to comfort a student may become illegal next. I don’t have kids, but if I did, I would hope they would be educated by someone more intelligent than them, Similarly, I like to be able to swing by a McDonald’s and not have to listen to the person in front of me sounding out “que-art-turd ponder with cheese. Hey, is cheese the orange stuff?”
- I am a straight-ish dude who can pass for white in a pinch. I am “fine”. My partner would have increasing anxiety as more and more of her basic human rights are taken away. An anxious partner is a partner who isn’t interested in doing fun stuff. Also, because I am not a complete sociopath, it would also harsh my mood.
- And just because you are proud of being in Florida: how many insurance companies have noped the hell out of that state? Good luck next hurricane season.
As for your pros:
- Outdoor activities: You should really look at the Southwest (and Colorado)
- “Regular launches into outer space”: Not really sure what that does for the “daily life” but, again, the Southwest and Texas is where a lot of space launches actually happen.
- Theme Parks; California. Also, it is a real shame that there is not some way that someone could get in a metal box, watch a few episodes of Frasier, and then arrive an hour or two away from Disney. Weird, it would almost be like they needed to fly to do that…
- State Income Tax: Yeah… this kind of goes along with “how many insurance companies have noped the hell out of that state” along with “so… does Texas have power this week?” but income tax, when put toward social programs and basic infrastructure, is really nice.
- Sunshine: Again, Southwest. Also, there is a lot less rain (except during monsoon season) which is nice for a few more years. But there also aren’t hurricanes which are only going to get a LOT worse as global warming becomes more and more of a problem.
- “At least were not Mississipi”. First, you meant “we’re”. If you had more funding for the teachers who hadn’t fled the state, you would know the difference. Also, Mississippi isn’t one of the ten worst states in the country by those metrics so… maybe you should try to be more like Mississippi?
Mississippi is literally the worst state in the country by actual, objective metrics.
Highest obesity rate, lowest life expectancy, lowest literacy, etc
I think they probably just forgot to look at Mississippi. It gets routinely ignored by media of all types. Most of the same stuff is going on there with the criteria that they dinged the other Southern states for.
But if you looked at real estate prices and general cost of living as the most important factor for living well, these Southeast states would be kicking ass instead of being “the worst.”
Florida’s real estate is very quickly becoming unattainable
Florida is not a normal member of the region so I don’t consider it part of the Southeast. Florida is just Florida.
It’s a nice place to visit for a vacation but I’d never live there either. Buying Florida real estate is a big risk anyway with climate change making all coastal habitats risky. I prefer my real estate to be a few hundred feet above sea level.
So do insurers
Is “dozens of studies forgot the existence of a state” the latest version of “fake news”?
Also, going by https://www.cnbc.com/2023/07/11/americas-top-states-for-business-2023-the-full-rankings.html, the top ten for cost of living are:
- Iowa
- Kansas
- Ohio
- Indiana
- Oklahoma
- West Virginia (hey!)
- Michigan
- Missouri
- Illinois
- Mississippi (ha ha ha ha ha)
So… yeah
No idea where you’re getting the idea I said it was fake news. It’s very politically slanted news, generated using specific stats to align with the narrative that they wanted to write a story about.
Please, by all means stay out of the Southeast if you believe it’s so terrible. I’ll continue to stay here, and enjoy owning my own house and land, with enough room that my family and pets can roam free in our own place. It’s quite nice to be a homeowner, and I couldn’t have afforded it in most of the rest of the USA.
I’ve been here voting against Republicans since the Bush Jr. term. Life has only gotten better over time, and since I’ve been living in such a low cost of living area I can afford to do everything I want to. Lots of wonderful people live here too, but if you generalize an entire geographic area as being all shitheads living in a terrible shithole, then you only weaken your own knowledge. Prejudice is mental weakness.
Pretty sure “mental weakness” is actively ignoring data all in an attempt to live in your own fantasy land. Just to summarize this interaction in the hopes that you decide to “strengthen your own knowledge”:
- “Ha, at least we aren’t Mississippi”
- “Actually, Mississippi ranks higher in most of these metrics. You probably want to be more like Mississippi”
- “Ha, they just forgot to measure Mississippi. Also, cost of living here is some of the cheapest in the country and if the listing had been weighted to that then it would be all about the southeast swamplands”
- “No, they didn’t forget Mississippi. Also, using the linked page to weight the study by cost of living still prioritizes the midwest for the most part”
- “Ha, see, I told you that my cost of living was super cheap and you are just prejudiced and weak!”
Great talk, have a good one.
Do you think all of that stuff really effects who your friends are, things you do with your family, the house you live in?
Literally yes. How is that something you’re even questioning?
probably effect it no matter where you live
Of course, but the point here is that some places are effected more than others. My state has very low unemployment, and very low homeless rates. That doesn’t mean there’s no homelessness and no unemployment, but it’s many times less than some other states. Is that a matter of intentional state policy? Probably not. But you are statistically less likely to be homeless or unemployed here. Making matters worse, the median income in my state is $10k higher than the median income of Florida (basically a 1/3rd increase), and the median household income is $20k higher (a 35% increase). That’s nearly the equivalent of having an entire additional income in a household in Florida.
no state income tax
My state also doesn’t have one of those, and we don’t get leveled by hurricanes at an increasing rate while the salt content in our water table rises.
at least were not Mississippi
Compared to my state, mathematically there’s almost nothing separating you from Mississippi. Your population is higher but your households are just as poor. That’s a concern, given the number of shockingly wealthy people that live in Floridian cities. In other words, there isn’t much upward mobility in either state.
The culture war bullshit is doing significant harm to the red states. They’re alienating significant segments of the population that, you know, contribute to society, and the only benefit they get in exchange is approval from conservatives, but according to polls the transphobes are a minority even within the right wing.
It’s almost like whether it impacts your daily life depends on two factors (1) are you a targeted minority or (2) you are not a targeted minority but know anyone who is or care about them to any degree.
I don’t know why you’re getting downvoted. It’s like when people talk about “third world countries” as if they’re unlivable shitholes that couldn’t possibly have any positive aspects. Like you point out, there are many aspects to life that aren’t directly tied to politics and generally the day-to-day really isn’t that bad. It reeks of elitism and it’s alienating.
It reeks of elitism and it’s alienating.
What aspect of recognizing Florida as a shithole with a fascist governor reeks of elitism?
The part where Republicans are playing the victim about everything now, so if you insult them, You’re just an elite liberal
/s if it wasn’t obvious
This particular chain of posts has nothing to do with republican vs democrat. The person I replied to said “Plus there’s hope that one day DeSantis will be gone and maybe a lot of those things will turn around.” Does that sound like a republican being happy about desantis to you? As for myself, I said dismissing entire places because of a few negative aspects (i.e. the republican rule there), even if major, is elitist because you’re ignoring the day-to-day that the person I was replying to mentioned that includes many positives.
It’s not a liberal exclusive thing. Trump dismissed a bunch of “third world countries” as shitholes and that was actually who I was thinking of when I made my post. You just assumed I was talking exclusively about liberals because you treat politics as a sport with only two teams and that because I hit some key words in your mind, it made you assume a whole load of things about me and my post.
Why not? Many republicans want trump gone because he makes it difficult to really hurt people and be greedy the way they want to
The part where you ignore the rest of the state’s aspects, focusing on the worst parts only.
“Yeah, the rampant bigotry and misogyny isn’t so bad so long as you’re not trans, black, latino, or a woman!”
That’s not what I said at all. If you think that putting imaginary words in other people’s mouths is a valid form of argument, you’re just a basic trump-chode.
Rampant bigotry and misogyny is not something that I have observed anywhere in the 21st century. When you interact with people in the real world, they are generally polite rather than bigots. Try going out into the real world sometime instead of believing everything you see on the Internet that’s pushed by rage-inducing algorithms to maximize engagement.
I wasn’t making an argument, I was engaging in ridicule. It’s because I find your position ridiculous, you see.
That people are turning their noses up at places where they don’t live and assuming that the presence of some bad aspects mean a place is entirely irredeemably bad. Like the person I replied to pointed out, there are day-to-day aspects that often don’t intersect with politics and there is some good to be had there, so condescending pitying is not always warranted. You missed the point by going back to focusing back on the bad parts and dismissing the entire place as a shithole because of them.
And, like all apolitical stances, that comes from a massive position of privilege. You can dismiss things as “politics” because they aren’t about your fundamental existence. Others can’t because “politics” becomes about their fundamental right to exist or what happens if they have a medical emergency.
And that ignores that “inclusiveness” is less than 14% of the weighting in this study/article. Those states are hellholes for more reasons than just “politics”. It is just that so much of those issues are fundamentally linked since it takes a special kind of stupid to think ANY of this hate is the top priority.
And you’re assuming that the negativity is all assumptions. Some of us have lived in these places and also agree they are overall shit holes. But that’s not to say that when people talk negatively about some place that they are implying that there are no positive aspects. There’s always a silver lining no matter how bad something is, but it is in no way elitist to focus on the overwhelming bad aspects and not mention the few positive aspects.
Whether you think this has a political bias or not, no matter what whose list you look up, they all basically say the same thing.
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Not a single state in that list was a surprise.
- Texas
- Oklahoma
- Louisiana
- (tie) South Carolina
- (tie) Alabama
- Missouri
- Indiana
- Tennessee
- Arkansas
- Florida
I personally agree with this list. But, we have to be pragmatic here. This is what CNBC says they did:
“The study measures quality of life issues including crime, health care, childcare and health care, as well as inclusive policies on discrimination and reproductive rights.”
See, the last two skew this study. People in these shit hole states (not all, but at least enough of the voting public) don’t want inclusive policies or reproductive rights. So, to them, this metric is backwards. They would argue that living in California or New York was way more terrible because of the brown people and gays.
This isn’t exactly a scientific study. It’s taking objective data to reach a subjective conclusion. Neat headline though.
Edit: many if them are arguing exactly that in this thread. With a nice dose of racism and misogyny thrown in. Nice. I love when shit comes full circle.
I mean… if you want to move to one of these states as potentially any type of person (ie. perhaps not white and straight) then the inclusive policies are not an optional feature. If you’re a woman, having the government meddle in your health decisions can actually be life threatening.
For white, straight folks, and especially males, it’s easy to think these other two factors just subjectively improve life, but that’s because they already have a baseline level of respect and power in society.
Based on your take, I’d guess you’re straight, white and male.
Granted, I’m also straight, white, and male… But there are a hell of a lot of women who support abortion bans AND adore Mr “Grab 'em by the Pussy!”
I know one who doesn’t believe God would allow a dangerous, nonviable pregnancy to take hold in (or in the case of ectopic pregnancies, outside of) a woman’s uterus. She just doesn’t believe something as sacred as a uterus can have that kind of flaw built into it.
And even if you could convince her dangerous pregnancies were real, I think @Ohthereyouare@lem.ee was saying that Republican women would not agree that their ability to survive an ectopic pregnancy is good or worth it if it also helps the “sluts” they despise to have more “convenience abortions.”
Surviving might seem pretty good to you and I, but that doesn’t make that ability objectively desirable to the people voting against their own interests. And they would be offended if their access to healthcare was deemed “better” in a quality-of-life metric than access to a set of theocratic restrictions.
They would tell you, “well I’m happier. Liberals think they can speak for me just because I’m a woman and my opinion doesn’t matter! But if they asked me, I’d tell them I would prefer to live in a place where the sanctity of life was valued! They’d have to censor me and edit me out of their videos because I wouldn’t support their narrative!”
Plenty of people are stupid and side with fascists who actively have their worst interests in mind. Back in the reddit days, that was the basis for /r/leopardsatemyface.
If people are dumb enough to want to be chattel in Gilead? Okay… People were dumb enough to go get on a plane and join ISIS. But I am going to generally still push for basic human rights.
I know one who doesn’t believe God would allow a dangerous, nonviable pregnancy to take hold in (or in the case of ectopic pregnancies, outside of) a woman’s uterus. She just doesn’t believe something as sacred as a uterus can have that kind of flaw built into it.
But I guarantee that the second that she (or any other woman with similar views) had a pregnancy that threatened their life, they’d opt for an abortion ASAP. They’ll rationalize that their abortion was justified and blessed by God, but all those other abortions are just “liberal sluts who want to kill babies” or something.
So what are we supposed to do to get them to stop choosing to be horrible like this? Can’t do nothing… ~Cherri
Reproductive rights is healthcare.
Yep. It is. That’s sorta the point though. “Worst” is subjective. Personally? I’d never move to one of those 10 places. But, a lot of them think that the lack of reproductive rights is a good thing, not a bad thing.
I don’t think that… But, a lot of folks in America do.
Just not a majority anywhere. Minority rule baby!
Cool, popular and correct are not synonyms
Abortion isn’t a right.
Only because the US doesn’t consider healthcare a right because we’re backwards af.
Healthcare isn’t a right because a right cannot be reliant on service provided by others. That’s just an entitlement given out by shitty governments. Not to mention that abortion isn’t Healthcare
Your right to a jury trial depends on the service of your fellow citizens, as well as the judge, etc.
Your right to vote depends on the service of many volunteers to work the polls, count votes, etc.
Rights are granted and protected by governments; whether they require a service is irrelevant.
I disagree that either of those is a right. They’re just procedural rules regarding government power.
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As someone born in Texas and now resides in Oklahoma I agree with this study.
The difference two years makes
As someone from West Virginia I’m stunned we didn’t make the list. McDowell county is hell on earth. The northern part of the state really does hard carry the rest of it.
Economic and health factors in this ranking are severely downplayed in favor of hot social issues.
If you want a good chuckle, here are the states that they say have the best economies. https://www.cnbc.com/2023/07/13/these-10-states-are-running-americas-best-economies-for-residents.html
Included in the top 10 are:
- Florida
- Texas
- Tennessee
- South Carolina
- Indiana
Best economies for CEOs.
Isn’t the inflation rate in Florida the highest in the nation?
One would only think that’s surprising or funny if they assumed that “best economy” and “best states to live in” necessarily have a one to one overlap. While I can see there being some overlap, l think we all know that business-friendly policies that foster economic growth almost always come with a suite of larger demographic costs.
The key is to seek balance between what’s good for business and what’s good for the public, and in that light it shouldn’t really come as a surprise that some of the most business-friendly states are also the worst places to live.
So basically this is just a “10 states where you can’t abort your unborn baby and men can’t compete against women in sports” list.
I know you have the ability to read. Go use it instead of posting crap like this. ~Cherri
Go read the article. It’s basically a “who’s who” of stricter abortion and “gender affirming surgery” laws, all other factors be damned. Education? Pfft, who needs it. Infrastructure and technology? Irrelevant. Business quality and work opportunities? As if you’d care about that.
How in the world did Mississippi not make this list?
Live in mississippi, it should be #1, like it always is for shitty metrics.
Fun mississippi fact for today, if you own an electric or hybrid car you have to pay extra taxes.
A lot of places do that, they say its because they don’t pay as much gas tax (which is true), which generally go toward maintaining roads and such.
I think we all know it doubles as a “liberal tax” though.
The only reasonable tax I could see being applied to an electric car is a weight tax, but that should be for all cars, not just electric. If your cars weighs more, you should pay more, especially at the city level.
More weight means it produces more wear and tear on roads. Not to mention they are more deadly, even at low speeds.
But I doubt this would happen in Mississippi lol
While true, it should be proportional to the damage.
There’s a reason why semis, construction, and plows deal 99% of the damage to highways lol.
While you can say everyone benefits from semi transportation… There are tons of people who’d prefer proper rail transit upgrades and infrastructure… So they’ll shoot down rail upgrades while also subsidizing truck damage lol.
One analysis contends freight-hauling trucks cause 99 percent of wear-and-tear on US roads, but only pay for 35 percent of the maintenance.
https://urbanmilwaukee.com/2017/06/22/murphys-law-how-trucks-destroy-our-roads/
Remember when Republicans tried to get bicyclists to pay their fair share of road damage? Lol.
Fun fact. WA is looking into getting rid of gas taxes and imposing a per mile driven tax due at registration.
Wisconsin here. I have to pay extra each year for a hybrid car :/
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Savage
Weird it’s the south east whodathunkit.
It is weird, because the entire point of racist ideology in America has historically been for personal gain by slaveowners, but now it’s just objectively hurting their states’ economies. Are they really getting that much benefit from exploitation like prison labor and such, or are they just so stuck in their ways that they’d rather feel powerful over others at their own expense?
They’d rather feel powerful over others at their own expense?
Yes. Was there ever a question? This is the conservative ideology.
I guess we wouldn’t have LeopardsAteMyFace if it wasn’t :/
Lost the Civil War and still losing today. “Loser” has become such a generic insult that it obscures the literally losing nature of so many people that live in this area.
None of the states listed are surprises nor the fact they are all Republican lead states either.
Red states are shit holes, more news at 11.
This could be another huge talking point for Democrats, but once again, this great opportunity to ding Republican governance is going to be missed since Democrats are so utterly incompetent to sell their successes and attack their opponents.
The inflation rate has fallen down to 3%, which is one of the lowest in the industrialized world right now. Have there been Democrats all over the news selling that success? No, of course not. Gotta keep those wins well hidden, dontchaknow!
Republicans and The Military actively worship an orange turd who is even more openly anti-military than I am. All while praising him for being good for soldiers and the troops and blah blah blah. Cops actively praise said orange dipshit when he is pro crime and terrorism rather than voting for the democrat geezer who has decades demonstrating he wishes he were a cop (and has a VP who basically is one…).
You are making the mistake of assuming that republicans are making educated decisions. They aren’t. They just do what they are told. Whether it is a slackjawed moron who is too afraid to ever wear a bowtie again or whoever is on OAN at this point. It isn’t about reality, it is about being told “the people you don’t like will be hurt”.
I do wish Democrats would cheer on more of the W’s. But moderates are similarly stupid and tend to vote for “decorum”. And, as amazing as it would be, watching Biden hop on stage and start doing DX crotch chops at the republicans while listing all his wins for labor and the everyday voter would probably do more harm than good.
No one thinks we will ever change those in the orange cult. Like zombies, they are long gone and collectively barely have one functioning brain cell.
Dems need to sell their wins to get their base excited - I’m so sick of the brasè attitude that most Dems have regardless of who their candidate is. They could have the most perfect candidate and they are always looking for someone else. They also need to get some independents on board. Neither party can win an election without getting some non-affiliated to vote for them.
The problem is that republicans are fundamentally united by what they hate. You can kick or piss on anyone and they’ll still vote for you so long as you make it clear you are hurting the black folk and the women who are the real problem.
Democrats? We are fundamentally not united. Because we actually want things. Many of us (I would like to say most but…) can agree on basic human rights. But I think UBI is one of, if not the, most important policies we need to have been “investigating” a decade ago to prepare for the upcoming ai job apocalypse (again, I was ready to vote for Yang. Fricking Yang)… Others want student loans to be erased. And others still want basic human rights regarding sick days that the rest of us forget about the moment twitter stops talking about it. And if you give those rail workers 4 sick days a year (jesus christ… it is depressing that that was a major win), that is great. Except all the folk with student loans are still angry and I am still dreading the mass unemployment that is a few years away.
And that is the problem. When leadership brags about getting a win, it mostly makes people say “you didn’t get me a win? Fuck it, voting doesn’t work, I am done with this”
And that doesn’t take into account the people who don’t know what they want other than “Bernie 2020”. Who are borderline trump levels of fixated. And the people who need to be explaining to them how government actually work, aren’t.
UBI is a joke and will only stand in the way of unity. To think the Dems should somehow rally around something that will never, ever happen is a pointless distraction. Might as well rally around the tooth fairy or unicorn and waste more time and energy instead of going after real issues.
So what are we supposed to do? How do we get things to improve on a national scale in any significant way for workers? ~Cherri
Support politicians who are brave enough to admit that we need to tax the rich and corporations at a higher rate, support programs that will bring manufacturing back to the US (no other industry is as bog of a job multiplier than manufacturing), support programs which lower the cost of entry for higher education.
Hand outs do not work. Not only would they never, ever pass Congress, they shouldn’t even be considered. UBI is a goddamn joke pushed by those who smoke too much weed and have no goddamn clue about life.
Corporate taxes shouldn’t be raised because corporate taxes are overwhelmingly regressive.
Hand outs absolutely do work, and while I’m not on the UBI train, all welfare programs should basically just give cash instead of stamps/benefits/etc
You’re basically just trying to sell doom & gloom to discourage people from wanting what is eminently attainable. Your reasons for doing so are your own, but one wonders if you’re just thoroughly indoctrinated, or if you have some other interest at stake.
Name ONE country which has implemented UBI successfully.
Many studies are ongoing, some with very positive results. Of course, they’re being hamstrung at every turn by conservative shitheads who want us all at the mercy of capitalism.
Amazing! The entire world is stupid, (insert as many additional derogatory terms as you wish). Except for you, of course!
Good on you mate!
True for values where “the entire world” is “Republicans and The Military (also Cops)”. So basically… false.
Twist the words, add words, deflect from the point, anything to advance your “superior” intellect. I see what you did.
Good on you mate!
P.S. It didn’t work.
Go back to reddit “mate.”
You can’t handle the truth can you mate? Amusing
The main question is imho what’s the cause - are they they worst to live in because of their politics? Or do people there vote populists because they are so unhappy with their lives
The American South has been reeling since the years following the Civil War. The economic strength of the Southern States was so tied up in agricultural slavery. When that system was dismantled it left a big hole in the fabric of those states socially, economically, politically. All of that resentment never went away it just changed forms over the years and turned into law and public policy. It’s easy to forget that the Civil War was not that long ago, not in terms of human social development in any case.
It doesn’t help that we elected qn apologist who decided to welcome them back with open arms not so long after the Civil War. Instead of adapting to the situation they were in, post-war, they ended up sucking on the feds that while they got equal representation as the non-slave states.
That’s not what happened. Johnson became president when Lincoln was assassinated and at that time the president and VP didn’t run on a single ticket and instead the VP slot went to the presidential runner-up, who, of course, was from the opposition. So we didn’t really elect Johnson; we elected Lincoln, but John Wilkes Booth happened and he fucked us for generations.
The article explicitly states one of the evaluation criteria is as follows:
So we consider inclusiveness in state laws by measuring protections against discrimination, as well as voting rights.
I’m guessing this is what led to the outcome the post title is highlighting.
They’re listed as the worst because this is basically just a political hit piece. They’ve defined the criteria for “best” to align with policy the democrats push and Republicans don’t. It’s hardly anything except a list of states that democrats agree with (or in the case of the bottom 10, don’t agree with)
