While low unemployment is good, I worry about the quality of employment.
For the San Antonio area, 46% of households — more than 240,000 households — can't afford the essentials such as housing, child care, food, transportation, health care and a basic smartphone plan.
This data from ALICE, which stands for Asset Limited, Income Constrained, Employed. It's a stubborn number that hasn't budged in over a decade. About half the city really struggles to make ends meet.
If you go by the federal poverty rate, the rate is 14%, which is about average for the US.
I'm not saying it wouldn't be hard raising a family on $68K here. I think it would be challenging, especially factoring in childcare, but the ALICE budget gives you $819/month for transportation. This seems excessive given you can get a $10k used car for about $228/month (I think). The pickings aren't amazing at that level, but I regularly drive a car that would currently be valued around $6-8k. It's safe and reliable. I haven't broken down other parts of the budget.
Statewide, the percent above ALICE threshold matches exactly that of California, at 57%, although there are slightly more in poverty (lower threshold than ALICE) in Texas: https://www.unitedforalice.org/national-overview
Is there data on what % of those are single earner households?
No, and that's a fair criticism. At $68K/year I would think you'd have to consider going down to 1 car for the family if feasible, or do that for several years until car 1 is paid off.
The main point I wanted to bring up with my comment was that San Antonio is just about average nationally wealth-wise, but the original comment I was replying to made it seem like half the population was living in very dire straits.
It seems kind of weird to just bring up a random place in Texas. The poverty rate in Huron California is over 40%. I'm not sure what that is supposed to prove though.
It seems better to bring up the state as a whole. 12.2% of Californians are living in poverty and 14% of Texans are.
If a few cities are having issues it seems like there are issues in those cities, not necessarily the state. That is not to say the state can't do anything to help, but if other cities are not experiencing those same issues then it seems like it is a different issue going on.
San Antonio was chosen because it has the highest poverty level out of the largest cities in Texas. Why not choose the largest city in Texas? It was chosen specifically to make look Texas look bad which is why I suggested looking at the entire state.
So, it's bad in both of the cities? I read the above comment as bringing awareness to the fact that not all "% is employed" stats is good. It might be super-privileged and entitled position of mine, but at this day and age, considering multiple-job or "barely making ends to meet" employments as a "win" is very disingenuous. I understand the general hardships (family history and etc.), just very weird when we think how we're doing "better" when it's very far from stressless life for North American standards. It is kinda hard to put it into words for some reason, just feels off.
My point was specifically pointing to the worst out of the large cities doesn't really prove a point about a state. It is possible that San Antonio is just doing something wrong on a city level and it has nothing to do with Texas. You need to look at a larger picture to figure out if Texas is doing something wrong. Huron having high poverty doesn't show California is doing something wrong any more than San Antonio shows Texas is doing something wrong.
Texas does have higher poverty as a whole than California so there is a possibility that Texas is doing something wrong. All I am saying is selectively choosing a city to prove a point doesn't actually prove the point about the whole state.
And? Choosing the worst case city doesn't prove the point about an entire state. Like I said, Texas as a state does have higher poverty than California so it quite possibly has an issue. I just don't think you can pick the worst city and extrapolate the entire state from that.
Poverty can be an indicator of people stranded in an environment where they cannot afford to move away to one with jobs, or it can be an indication of people attracted to an environment where they can improve their lives at a lower cost of living.
In a large enough geography there can of course be both dynamics at play.
If a place's population increased and the impoverished population shot up, then, at first, it would give me pause that perhaps people were getting stuck there. It wouldn't be the first time that brain drain happened in advance of urban retooling and job loss. Witness the great brain drain from the rural US into inner city manufacturing neighborhoods while factory jobs were already beginning to leave those city centers. The successful cities of England's North endured something similar at the same postwar moment in their much longer history.
That Texas keeps showing this behavior of parallel growth in popularity and poverty for decades on end, though, makes much more explanatory the latter idea -- that e.g. metropolitan San Antonio is popular and a ladder for the underdogs of both the American economy and several Central American ones. California had a very similar and bipartisan growth dynamic in the 1910s-1980s before some Californians started pulling up the ladder behind them. Would be interesting to see a trajectory of housing costs near job growth in that state over time and whether land offers Texas any real buffer against such a trajectory.
Texas has a pretty strong and diversified economy. Lots of oil both in midland/Odessa and in the gulf. Energy sector is big in Houston. Decent tech presence in Austin although lots of focus on lower level jobs (phone/support/etc). Dallas has lots of finance. Manufacturing is big there too, and transportation.
One of the things I worried about when I moved out of Texas was leaving such a strong and diversified economy… but after Covid and the normalization of remote work, this is thankfully less of an issue now. I hope remote work is here to stay. It helps prevent the centralization of labor around existing cities and lets the wealth of society spread more uniformly throughout the country.
Yeah, I'm from a poor rural community and the difference remote work would make to a place like Walton, Nova Scotia if future generations grow up feeling secure in it would be hard to express. Really breaking a cycle of poverty for a lot of regions that are absolutely breathtaking in natural beauty.
My anecdotal observation is the opposite. It seems like since Covid, demand to live in big cities has gone up much faster than before. You can mostly see / feel this in property prices.
Yeah, small data point, but everyone in my circles who tried "remote life" realized why they're not fond of it, moved back into cities. It's not for everyone, and it's definitely not for me. Giving up walkability, being surrounded basically endless amount of options, and the ability to get away if I want to is a no-brainer for me.
I recently moved from Austin to Portland voluntarily to retire in a lifestyle less hostile to the people living there. The quality of life in Texas is far from good.
Just to think you guys could have both moved out of shitty homeless-adjacent apartments into the inner suburbs and really saved some u-haul bills. No need to drive across Utah.
Generally politics, specifically state mandated school curriculum.
Right after we moved out, Oregon passed laws decriminalizing hard drugs and removed graduation requirements (and they are considering continuing waiving graduation requirements I hear). The Oregon teacher's association (and gov in general) got a sweet retirement deal in the 90's, that they "realized" that deal is draining the state of money it needs. The teachers association is trying to teach fewer hours each day (for the kids) and have more half days (once a week) for teacher prep (for the kids). One of my kids was directly saying teachers would talk up direct action activism the the like in class. Then the new curriculum came out that had sex ed starting in Kindergarten and had massive ideological components to them. This was in 2020 and it has continued unabated from there. These were state level activities; districts can't meaningfully push back; teachers could be fired for not adhering to them. I have family who are teachers so I don't speak from ignorance here.
Texas ISDs (independent school districts) also get funding from the state, but they get much more funding locally. Practically speaking, Texas ISDs vary much more. So do your research. Then support what is good and seek to improve to make it even better.
I'd like to consider myself of at least average intelligence if not slightly above, and I'll be damned if I could tell anyone what "retire in a lifestyle less hostile to the people living there" is supposed to actually mean.
I'm waiting patiently until the academic studies on COVID response vs. what happens next. Assuming the actual rules got wound back fairly quickly, we've got a really interesting natural experiment on the go into what real medium-term business confidence looks like when governments roll in and shut things down unexpectedly.
I don't know how this is relevant. Are you trying to hypothesize that Texas' "keep business open" response to COVID helped business medium-term confidence?
I will point out that Texas has one of the country's HIGHEST unemployment rates:
Okay, maybe you should do that and come back with a proper analysis. Personally I would trust federal numbers more than “some guy says nuh-uh that can’t be right.”
It’s also business climate (regulation) and crime. While SF I’d not Cal it’s a bell weather and businesses are rethinking NY State and Cal. Of course for many it’s still viable to stay but some have moved and some more are considering it.
I don’t mean it’ll become Detroit —a one trick pony, and collapse but it could mimic 1980s NYC when biz moved across the river.
Is it really crime? San Antonio, Dallas, and Houston all have higher burglary rates than Oakland, CA and San Francisco. New York City has the lowest burglary rate on the entire top 100 list.
Dallas and Houston have higher total violent crime rates than Los Angeles.
I'm also unsure what California business climate is stifling businesses there, considering it is the #1 GDP economy in the country, 5th highest state in GDP per capita, and only 5 or 6 entire countries in the world have larger economies. Is there a specific regulation that is stopping your business idea from working in California?
As per the source you linked, San Francisco has the 4th highest property crime rate in the US, with about 1 in every 16 people being victimized per year. There was also a joke headline a while back: 'San Francisco becomes first city to eliminate crime, after legalizing all crime.' Like in all good jokes there's a shade of truth - when crimes are not reported, not prosecuted, or reclassified then they do not show up in crime stats. DAs that choose not to pursue/prosecute crimes, and people choosing not to report them (perhaps because of no expectation in justice), will bring down crime rate stats, without bringing down crime rates.
I picked out burglary rates because that’s the type of property crime that impacts businesses.
Speculating on effectiveness of the DA and how much crime goes unreported would have to benchmark other cities to be meaningful. We can’t just assume that crime is more frequently reported and prosecuted elsewhere based on a joke headline.
Ironically, SF’s property crime problem is likely heavily impacted by the high demand to live there in the first place and the resulting high cost of housing. SF can alleviate crime by building housing, but I’m not sure how Peoria, IL, Steubenville, OH, or Bridgeport, CT solve their crime and drug issues long term. At least SF has a clear path out.
Burglary is breaking and entering. Theft is the main issue affecting businesses in San Francisco, for which it has the second highest rate in the country. People come in, take whatever they want, and leave. If it's under $950, it's a misdemeanor. And that's if the perp is caught and charged.
The law only works as a deterrence for crime when there is a reasonably high chance of being caught, and the consequences work as a significant deterrent. To their credit the San Francisco Police Department have a pretty nice page on this exact issue here. [1] Not so much to their credit, the clearance rate (cases solved) for theft is at 3.4%. Then those get sent over to the DA who may or may not even choose to prosecute it. There's also things like community courts [2] that can help ensure you get the most gentle slap on the wrist if caught.
Pair these systems alongside the surplus of high value targets, and it just seems like you're creating an extremely enticing area for thieves. I also imagine this all has to be extremely demoralizing for police, which one could expect would lead to something of a downward spiral. It's just generally not a great situation.
So I think it’s pretty common for property crime to have a low clearance rate especially in larger municipalities.
I think you’re also downplaying the fairness of misdemeanors for property crime under $950. Why should stealing a candy bar or a DVD be a felony? Do you realize how life-ending a felony conviction can be? You basically can’t get a decent quality job ever again, which isn’t going to lower the property crime rate by making desperate people more desperate.
And also, misdemeanors can be upgraded to felonies via repeat offenses and surrounding circumstances (e.g., armed robbery is always felony).
I think San Francisco has a perception of being a liberal haven for criminals with lax enforcement, but the more likely reality is that it operates similarly to most other large cities. The DA isn’t twiddling their thumbs and allowing violent robbers to get off with misdemeanors. That perception of San Francisco law enforcement is pushed by political opponents.
The problem with bias is that it generally feels normal, and so without some substantial degree of introspection, you might see everybody else as being biased, while assuming your own views are the truly correct ones. Try to read what you're writing as if somebody else wrote it, and you don't really have any opinion on this issue.
You're talking about a city with the 2nd highest theft rate, the overall 4th highest property crime rate, and comparing it against cities that not only have much lower crime rates, but ones where the clearance rate is at least twice as high for the crimes that are committed. Then there are other probable issues, but ones seemingly neither of us has been able to dig up data on, like prosecution rates vs dismissal/reclassification. To claim these differences amount to nothing, or only exist due to bias in others, is just not really reasonable.
You can accept San Francisco having a high crime rate, but think that the other niceties you enjoy about the city more than compensate for it. Every city, every state, every country has its own set of pros and cons. It's only balance that the 'big picture' really comes out, and that's also going to be extremely subjective.
I live in Austin and lived in San Antonio and the same complaints about the DA and underreported crime are rampant, especially if you believe the subreddit or my uncle who lives 6hrs away in small town and hasn’t visited in 4 years. How true is that really?
NextDoor can give you a pulse but it’s dirty data. People will think they’re a crime victim but they may not be and then you have others who try to downplay the crime —oh it’s not really a crime, it’s a city, these things happen.
Point is NextDoor can provide some insight into crime as often what is mentioned in that medium is unreported to authorities though often you will have members recommend the victim report the crime to police.
I misread you, fixed my comment. But I'm still confused, what is not good about the business climate? It is the #1 GDP in the country, #5 GDP per capita, larger than all but 5 or 6 countries in the entire world. Home to a huge number of companies in the S&P 500 like Alphabet, Apple, Meta, Chevron, Intel, Walt Disney, HP, Cisco, Oracle, and the list goes on. Why haven't they moved to other states?
What, specifically, is bad about the business climate in California? And I'm talking about things that can't be easily refuted with basic facts.
The sentiment is as old as the gold rush and it’s nonsense. I’ve heard people proclaim the end of business in California since the day I moved here and the only notable example I can think of in 30 years is Tesla moving their HQ… and they just announced this year that they’re building a new “engineering HQ” in California anyway.
A lot of the downsides that people like to complain about California like regulatory burden, bureaucracy, and high taxes are mostly true, but until housing cost skyrocketed in the last decade none of that mattered to most people. The vast majority of California’s problems stem from unbalanced supply and demand across a number of goods and services.
Ever since the budgetary woes of the 2000s, the state government has really turned it around and with all the laws tackling the housing problem passed in the last few years, California is going to keep on trucking just like haters gonna keep on hating (which they should, we’re overpopulated enough as it is).
The bureaucracy is exaggerated, too. Every large municipality and state has it. California isn’t unique and the idea that they are an extremely high tax state is also bunk (nobody seems to make a stink on the national stage about the high taxation status of Minnesota, Rhode Island, or New Jersey, 3 of the 9 states with higher overall tax rates than California).
California is just a political target by a certain party that fumbled their previous dominance of elections in the state and remains butthurt about it, and they can make the entire state into a scapegoat because they know they’ll never control the state again anyway. https://www.ocregister.com/2019/12/02/the-decline-and-fall-o...
The taxes also vary widely depending on your circumstances. Rich people complain loudly for obvious reasons but everyone I know who’s done that found the difference to be far less significant, or even negative since they needed to pay more for private alternatives to state services. There is a difference but it’s not what popular mythology would have you believe.
There’s also a huge life stage variation: subsidized pre-k of aftercare, for instance, are either worth nothing or a hefty amount depending on whether you have small children. A big one I’m hearing about from extended family is elder care - once someone can’t safely drive everywhere, living in a minimal service area is not saving money, and I think we’ll hear more about that as the boomers who retired somewhere scenic get a bit older.
> they know they’ll never control the state again anyway.
California is the state of Schwarzenegger, Regan, and proposition 8. Like every other state, it's an archipelago of blue cities in a sea of red. Democrats are in power today; do not mistake that for forever. I don't think Republican party's current strategy of badmouthing California at every turn is going to earn them votes needed to flip the state; but their strategy in the US House of Representatives is an even more spectacular failure. Rather, the party's lack of coherent strategy seems to be the source of its manifold failures today. I do wonder what a post-Trump Republican party will look like, but it will come, and I wouldn't presume to predict its future.
Democrats (and Republicans) need to understand that the majority of immigrants lean conservative but the Dems have successfully captured them. If Repubs would position themselves differently they would be a natural option for those fist gen families.
> Democrats (and Republicans) need to understand that the majority of immigrants lean conservative but the Dems have successfully captured them
Trump improved among Hispanic voters by roughly 10 points between 2016 and 2020 [0] - and in some areas his improvement was a lot bigger than that - e.g. some heavily Hispanic border regions of Texas saw Trump improve his vote by over 20 points
(Of course, much of the increase of support among Texan Hispanics is strictly speaking not immigrants, rather people who have lived in the area since back when it was still part of Mexico-but I’m not sure if that’s a significant factor or just a quibble.)
Similarly, there is evidence that the GOP may have significantly improved their share of the Muslim vote over the last few years [2]
How many employees in Texas are illegal? States that want to complain about illegal immigration should mandate E-Verify for all employers. This would force them to be honest about how much businesses profit from illegal labor. But it is easier to keep gullible voters distracted talking about walls.
Verifying employment eligibility is mandatory in all states.
> All U.S. employers must properly complete Form I-9 for every individual they hire for employment in the United States
Although that requirement probably doesn’t apply to contractors.
Edit: Major pitfall (or advantage depending on your perspective) of the I-9 system is that it only requires employers to fill out the form and “keep it on file” in case the government asks to see it.
E-verify introduces the ability to share and verify that information digitally with the government (where without e-verify the form would just sit in someone’s filing cabinet or Google drive).
I am an employer who is required to use E-Verify. Very few employers use E-Verify. There is no verification of the social security number done for an I-9 form if the employer is not using E-Verify.
I-9 technically requires employers to inspect the original document (passport, or drivers license + social security card, or birth certificate + photo ID, etc). Photocopies not allowed.
Inspecting the original document should be a high enough bar for verification (assuming the employer isn’t knowingly trying to subvert the system). E-verify exists to provide an alternative to inspecting the physical document.
But in reality I’m guessing most small employers take shortcuts and don’t inspect the documents as they should or don’t keep records of I-9 at all (the form is very rarely needed for anything)
The SS card needs to be combined with a 2nd form of photo ID (or voter registration card, which I’ve always found odd since that sounds really easy to forge)
But yes, someone could forge a SS card and a photo ID. It would be up to the employer to decide whether anything looks suspicious.
Yes, and the second form of identification need say nothing about legal eligibility to work.
It would be a huge burden to ask the employer to verify these documents.
I have worked in and with several businesses that knowingly turn a blind eye to the fake documents they photocopy/scan and file. The system is working as designed, propping up the businesses profiting from illegal labor.
Those who claim to be upset about illegal immigration don't want E-Verify mandates. They want a permanent underpaid underclass.
For the San Antonio area, 46% of households — more than 240,000 households — can't afford the essentials such as housing, child care, food, transportation, health care and a basic smartphone plan.
This data from ALICE, which stands for Asset Limited, Income Constrained, Employed. It's a stubborn number that hasn't budged in over a decade. About half the city really struggles to make ends meet.