Texas, here we come.
Economist: "Texas, here we come."
http://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2010/06/migration
"It doesn't tell us anything we didn't already know. Migration statistics reveal that people are moving in droves to Texas. Why? Jobs and no state income taxes."
- matt's blog
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Comments
I looked at the article as
I looked at the article as well as the comments tagged to it, some of which agree with the conclusions and some of which don't. I've lived here all my life and I noticed people moving down shortly after air conditioning became standard in cars and most homes.
As a committed transplant
As a committed transplant from NY2TX I can't think of a better place to move from than the NY City/LI area and a better place to move to than South Texas (in my case, especially San Antonio).
The temperature is high, but that is alot different than oppressive heat as found in places like New York City, Tampa, Houston and New Orleans.
There's a joke about a couple who had dated for a long time and the he guy finally gathers the nerve to ask his female friend to marry him...the punchline regarding kissing in a hot and wet place is, I will never kiss you in Houston.!
The sad thing is the job
The sad thing is the job market here is built up to be a lot better than it really is.
Softwarejanitor is right.
Softwarejanitor is right. These top ten lists touting Austin in particular ("best places to weather the recession", etc.) incent people to come here, only to find that there are many unemployed folks here who already are working their built-up networks, which a newcomer obviously wouldn't have. Add the underemployed folks, frequently from choice, such as college grads waiting tables because they love the Austin scene and who already have their restaurant/bar networks, and the newcomers are even shut out of many service positions.
A while back a friend was shopping Craigslist for a roommate. He found so many ads reading something like "Coming to Austin next week, need a cheap place to live while I search for a job, but willing to wait tables or whatever it takes until I find a job in my field." That's sad.
Wayne C. Vermillion
Instructional Designer/Project Manager
Its an old saying around
Its an old saying around here "Austin has the best educated waiters in the world"... And it is true. It is not at all uncommon to chat up a bartender or waiter around here and find out they've got a Masters or PhD and are working service industry because they can't find a better job without leaving Austin. There's just such a huge glut of highly educated and experienced talent around here and more arriving all the time that it is a very tough market for everyone, but especially for anyone without experience and/or a well developed network.
I really wish the media would quit hyping to potential job seekers and start telling employers that Austin has an over-abundance of high quality people seeking new or better employment opportunities. My guess based on the number of people around here looking for work is that the talent pool here could easily accommodate employer(s) seeking tens of thousands of skilled people.
I also wish that people would do their research and due diligence BEFORE they move. In a job market like we are in now, moving without a job already lined up is not a good idea -- it is a quick way to end up homeless.
Austin is full. Go away.
Austin is full. Go away. We don't have the roads to support more people and we don't have the water supply to support more people. The infrastructure here is overloaded. All of you people moving in have turned Austin from a nice town to just another big city. Really, go somewhere else.
757,000 people doesn't make
757,000 people doesn't make Austin a BIG especially since that "tiny" to your south (San Antonio) has almost twice as many people and it really isn't a BIG city. I guess its all a matter of perspective.
When you count the suburbs,
When you count the suburbs, it's over 1 Million. WHen I moved here it was 250K and Cedar Park was out in the sticks. It's a big city.
It's all a matter of
It's all a matter of perspective. So yes, over a million people in the SMSA is a big city. If you deal with the surrounding burbs of San Antonio (thus Bexar County) the pop. is almost 1.7 million (2009 estimate).
Yet before moving to Texas, I lived in Nassau County and 2009 pop. est. was 1.4 million/adjacent Suffolk County was 1.5 million.
It's all a matter of perspective.
Yes, it's a matter of
Yes, it's a matter of perspective, but sheer size isn't all there is to it. I've lived in both Austin and San Antonio. One is larger than the other. One has more of a big-city feel to it than the other. But the one that feels more like a big city isn't the larger one.
I'm sure it's change since I moved back to Austin a couple of decades ago, but living in San Antonio felt like living in the world's largest small town. Austin felt like a smallish town when we moved here in 1976, but when we moved back it had really grown up, and not necessarily in good ways. I do somewhat miss the old Austin, but you can't go back again.
When we moved to Austin the first time we were one year removed from central New Jersey, so I do understand your comparison to Long Island. That whole area is interesting to visit, but for the most part I didn't enjoy living there. There's nothing in central Texas that remotely compares, and to me that's a good thing.
On the other hand, I'm not quite ready to move to Big Spring, even if one of my dogs did decide to go there on his own.
(Okay, go look up Big Spring on Google Maps, I'll wait.)
Traffic messes and all, Austin is still one of the better places to live, and people have been coming here, even without jobs, for as long as we've been here because of its well-deserved reputation. It's not a new phenomenon, and it's not going to stop.
--
Jerry Dunham
I wasn't born a Texan, but I got here as fast as I could.
I think the point was that
I think the point was that Austin has been growing at a high rate. Granted, everyone who moves here wants to the last one in the door. Who am I to talk? I moved here 13 years ago.
I moved here after you...
I moved here after you... My biggest complaint are the people who move here and then want to turn it into the place they left. I left where I used to live because I didn't like it and when I moved here I embraced the way Austin is.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nMhaehb5AnE