Les Jones: State Population Changes

January 10, 2006

Population > State Population Changes

Michael Barone looks at state population changes and what they mean for upcoming elections. Average growth was 5.3 percent. In general, the only Northeast states that registered above-average gains were the economically liberal states of Delaware and New Hampshire. All of the Western states registered above-average growth except for Montana and Wyoming. Louisiana registered the least growth (1.2%) even before Hurricane Katrina. On the political picture:

These numbers are mostly good news for Republicans. The average population growth in the 31 states carried by George W. Bush was 5.6 percent. The average population growth in the 19 states and the District of Columbia carried by John Kerry was 3.9 percent.

And there's this:

For internal migration, the two big losers were New York (1,001,100) and, perhaps surprisingly to many readers but in line with the 1990s trend, California (664,460). New York's internal population loss was almost precisely the same as Florida's internal migration gain (1,057,619), while California's internal migration loss was almost precisely the same as the internal migration gain of Arizona and Nevada (679,105). That's not to say that all these internal migrants went to Florida, Arizona, and Nevada, but you get the idea.

There's an official census in 2010 that will almost certaintly re-apportion Congressional representation and electoral votes in favor of red states. If the Democrats have a plan to counteract these ingrained population trends they need to get cracking on it before they go the way of the Shakers (and that Wikipedia link puts the best possible spin on a religious movement that went extinct because of a belief in celibacy, a lack of personal property rights, and the dissolution of the family unit).

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Comments

Now if only we'd stop counting illegal aliens in the population for determining representation. NY and CA influence on the rest of the nation would plummet.

Posted by: AlphaPatriot at January 09, 2006

Its one of the trends Grover Norquist picked up on years ago and likes to talk about (especially now in light of the current scandals) as proof that the Republican majority is here to stay. As he says, the Rs might lose the occaisional presidential race cause they turn so much on an individuals personality, but the long term trends will only further cement the Republican's grips on the Senate and House.

Its a nice thought, but I have my doubts.

First, much of the population growth is the result of hispanic immigration. As a group, they tend to vote Democrat simply because of the existing political culture of expected handouts in Mexico and Central America. Further, Dems do a good job marketing to poor, uneducated masses. The problem for the Dems though is once Hispanics begin to look at issues (especially social issues) they quickly start voting for Republicans and in recent years the Rs have made tremendous inroads into the hispanic vote. Still, I don't think the Rs will make enough inroads to even out there vote.

More troubling though, is the fact that the other part of that population growth comes from transplants out of New York and California and New Jersey and other liberal states. Those states are shedding residents and they are going somewhere. Sure, many are leaving because of economic concerns but they tend to be turned off by right wing religious nut jobs (rightfully so in some instances) and the likelihood of their voting republican is slim. Further, as they migrate to Republican states they also begin to take over parts of the state government and impose their own liberal agendas on society.

Of course, only time will tell.

Posted by: countertop at January 10, 2006

countertop mostly covered what I was going to say, except I'd more generally say that I have no idea why/how he thinks population changes in a state without demographics are statistically relevant to the political situation in a state at all..

Posted by: Chris Wage at January 10, 2006

"As a group, they tend to vote Democrat simply because of the existing political culture of expected handouts in Mexico and Central America."

I thought they were fairly evenly split as a group.

Posted by: cube at January 10, 2006

I think it is debatable as to what exactly will happen when people emigrate from blue to red states. It's possible they'll make the red states more purple, but it might or might not be enough to matter.

And maybe the people who emigrate will be red staters at heart, and will make the red states redder and leave the blue states bluer. If that happens, the swing states will be even more important.

BTW, I'm not crazy about the whole red state/blue state thing because I think it's a pretty crude statistical tool. (For instance, Tennessee was red in the last two elections and blue in the two before that.) In this case, though, I think it's fairly useful.

Posted by: Les Jones at January 10, 2006

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