Moving Away From Unions, Literally
From Dr. Mark J. Perry via the Club for Growth (hat tip: KY Club for Growth)...
Statistically, it's only correlation-- albeit strong correlation. The theory supports causation as well: all things equal, if you make it more painful for firms to be productive, they will tend to fold or take their jobs elsewhere. And all things equal, people will want to live where there are jobs.
So, it's not "right-to-work" as a significant factor-- and whatever it's correlated with-- what is the explanation?
People are migrating to right-to-work states and leaving those that aren't. From Dr. Perry:
The eight states enjoying the greatest net in-migration of people from other states between 2000-2008 all have Right to Work laws. But of the eight states suffering the worst out-migration, only Katrina-hit Louisiana has such a law (see chart below).
posted by Eric Schansberg @ 3:47 PM
2 Comments
2 Comments:
I notice that all of the states with asterisks have warmer climates than the states without asterisks.
Yes, of course. But they've been warm for quite awhile! ;-)
So, we're still left explaining why there's been a change in population?
The most likely explanation is that Southern states simply have a more hospitable environment for business/productive activity-- from right-to-work to tax rates and the price of land.
Then, we can throw in the massive reductions in transaction costs since the late 70s-- from dereg in key industries [transport and communications] under Carter and Reagan and big tech advance. This has made it far easier for product, labor and capital to move around. What we often describe as globalization has an important regional component as well.
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