It’s Time For Liberals To Colonize Red America
Remote work and low costs of living present an amazing political opportunity
In a recent article, I discussed the fact that a supermajority of Americans are in favor of a host of liberal policy goals. I pointed out that a political party promising to pass laws supported by sixty percent of the public would enact all of the following:
- a public option for Obamacare
- paid parental leave
- higher taxes on the rich and large corporations
- a federally recognized right to abortion during the first trimester
As well as a slate of gun control reforms, including universal background checks, mental health screening, and bans of assault rifles and high capacity magazines.
We’re told that our society is deeply polarized, but if there is this much agreement on so many issues, maybe polarization per se isn’t the problem. Somewhere between the public’s desire to see reforms enacted, and the actual legislative process, the people’s will is being thwarted.
Gerrymandering is often blamed, and there is some truth to the accusation. Liberal voters tend to reside in cities, making them easier to “pack” and “crack.” But that’s not the whole story. David Wasserman and Ally Flinn have calculated that gerrymandering can explain only about 17 percent of the decline in the competitiveness of House races over the last twenty years.
Unless we shifted to proportional representation, just eliminating gerrymandering wouldn’t be enough. It wouldn’t neutralize the advantage that rural voters get from single member districts with first-past-the-post polling. Indeed, many Canadians have recognized this fact. They can see that first-past-the-post voting is exacerbating the political and cultural divide between urban and rural residents. As a result, there is now a movement in Canada to do away with first-past-the-post voting.
So what is the real reason why our elections are so uncompetitive, and so often deliver a slate of legislators who do not represent the actual views of the American people?
According to Harry Enten at FiveThirtyEight, the main source of dysfunction is the fact that Americans have been sorting themselves geographically. Over the last generation, liberals have consistently moved to places with a reputation for having liberal cultural values, and conservatives have moved to places known for having conservative cultural values.
The problem for liberals is that their preferred destinations tend to be urban areas in coastal states, while conservatives prefer rural areas. As a result, the Senate map has gotten much more daunting for Democrats. And gerrymandering, though practiced by both parties, has on average netted Republicans a twenty-seat advantage over the last few election cycles.
It’s clear we can’t rely on Congress to fix this problem. You can’t force people to move. The good news is that the pandemic, by expanding opportunities for remote work, has made it more possible than ever for someone to work in the heartland for a corporation based on the coast. Recent surges in consumer prices have also made low cost of living states in the Midwest and South more attractive than ever.
Now, I understand that liberal voters tend to be younger and better educated, and as a result tend to want to live in cities or suburban areas where there are more opportunities for cultural enrichment, better nightlife, better schools, et cetera. I’m not saying that liberals should all start moving to farms in Nebraska or ranches in Wyoming.
Instead, I think liberals should start looking for opportunities in large cities in states that are starting to trend blue — like Georgia and Arizona — or that have been swing states in the recent past and might be again — like Missouri, Ohio, Iowa, North Carolina, and Florida.
It’s taken a generation to get us as sorted as we are, and it may take another generation to undo. But we have the numbers. If we want to turn our political aspirations into reality, we will have to colonize Red America.
