Thread by @Noahpinion

1/Here is a thread about TEXAS, my home state - its politics, its economy, its future, and what it says about America as a whole.

2/Beto O'Rourke showed the world that Texas really could be - and probably already is - a purple state.

As usual, the blue took hold in the cities and spread outward to the suburbs. Urbanization is the story of Texas' blue drift.

nationalreview.com/magazine/2018/…

3/Diversity is another huge part of the story. Texas is a majority-minority state, and has been for a decade.

texastribune.org/2012/05/17/on-…

4/Urbanization and racial diversity are not unrelated trends.

Texas has some of the country's most diverse cities. By some measures, Houston is more diverse than New York City. latimes.com/nation/la-na-h…

5/But this diversity has NOT made Texas into a dystopia of distrust and social isolation, as opponents of diversity imagine. Instead, Texas is still a place where people help their neighbors.

Nowhere was this better demonstrated than in Hurricane Harvey.

https://twitter.com/Noahpinion/status/957759158962372608

6/Here are just a few photos of what Texas looks like now.

7/But how did Texas build these great cities?

In fact, there was no one approach. In Austin, there were intentional efforts to create a tech cluster...
kansascityfed.org/PUBLICAT/newgo…

8/But in Houston, the oil industry naturally turned into the oil services industry, which is actually a really high-tech industry that employs tons of smart people and immigrants.

forbes.com/sites/uhenergy…

9/Dallas, San Antonio, and El Paso each also found their own unique development paths. bisnow.com/dallas-ft-wort…

10/Texas' state government tried to encourage the development of these cities every step of the way. Yes, with business-friendly policies - which Texas conservatives strongly believed would boost business, and which may have done so - but also with infrastructure, resources, etc.

11/Texas' goal was always growth, and growth was achieved.

npr.org/sections/thetw…

12/Basically, here is the Modernization Sequence for an American region:

Desire for growth --> Policies to boost knowledge industries + openness to immigration --> Urbanization and diversity --> Liberal social values

13/The only way to avoid this sequence, probably, is not to grow - or to be lucky enough to be able to grow without knowledge industries (e.g. South Dakota).

Red states would appear have a choice - grow the economy and become blue, or stagnate the economy and remain red.

14/Trumpism, with its emphasis on old-line manufacturing, coal mining, etc., is an attempt to turn back the modernization sequence - to return to an America where prosperity doesn't depend on the kind of knowledge industries that create thriving, diverse cities.

It will fail.

15/Already we can see the fruits of the Modernization Sequence in a number of states - Georgia, North Carolina, Colorado, Virginia. Texas is the biggest and best (of course), but certainly not the only one.

16/The writing is one the wall - prosperous places are voting Democratic. This is no coincidence. It's the Modernization Sequence in action.

cnbc.com/2018/11/15/cha…

17/While there's a possibility that Trumpists will crash America entirely, and turn us into an economic backwater, and thus halt the Modernization Sequence, I'd bet against that succeeding.

People want to prosper. They don't want to suffer just to hold back modernity.

18/You can crush the flowers...but you can't stop the spring.

(end)