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Not being strong in economics is not a personal attack. The trailer and shack owning status in WV is not comparable to actual equity in other places. When I was there in the 70's land could be had for $100 an acre - sometimes less.
The problem was - the land was worthless.
Would you rather own an acre in WV or one on the Gulf Coast of Florida or near the San Diego waterfront?
This stuff is quite obvious.
If you post foolish things expect to be debated on it. Post some sense and many will likely agree with you.
"According to a new George Washington University study, West Virginia receives more money per person from federal government programs than the rest of the country. The Mountain State gets 26.2% of its income from programs like Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid — well above the national average of 16.7%."
And, BTW, those same old Confed states take the most after WV:
"As a general trend, the study also found that southern states are much more likely to receive the most federal money — after West Virginia, the next four are: Mississippi, 24.0%; Arkansas, 22.8%; Kentucky, 22.4%; and Alabama, 21.8%"
I'm glad to "learn ya" as we said in WV, but when you talk "welfare"....that's not exactly the same! Much of this money is in Medicare, Medicaid, Federal Programs for poverty, etc....you may not classify it as "welfare"...which is a broad term with no definition.
Bottom line is I pay - and I just got my tax return tonight and can assure you that I am paying big......
" Tax revenue primarily comes from highly developed urban regions like the Northeast, California and the big Great Lakes cities like Chicago. That wealth flows to rural areas — which happen to be predominantly GOP — and the South, which is generally much poorer than the rest of the country"
I was always taught that one shouldn't bite the hands that feed them. This is the opposite case.
WV is bad enough economically...can you imagine if over 1/4 of the entire income was taken away?
Put another way, WV is the most Socialist State in the USA. It's also the "biggest taker"....
Unfortunately we live in opposite world these days where lies are truth and so on. But these numbers are too large to be rounding errors.
I live in WV and I can guarantee you that I pay a lot in taxes also. I'm questioning the wisdom of condemning taxes but promoting the idea of owning land that is going to have very high property taxes.
I won't pretend to say that living on the Ohio River (to be factual, I live a couple block up from it) is as nice as living on the ocean but it's not so bad and it's far, far, far more affordable.
Again, it's not about you. WV was a very Blue state not all that long ago. (D)'s cared about the working class then.
Our electorate sent Rockefeller and Byrd to D.C.
Right you are.
Dems cared - and still do - about Unions and stuff like that. Real advancements for working people.
But WV was - to put it simply - raped by corporate America and Europe (London). That's not the fault of any particular political party...it's a problem with our system that allows such crimes.
One thing leads to another. There are no jobs, so there are no (or few) Unions. This means there is not much money and therefore not many educational or development opportunities. So the population falls down instead of being lifted up. Many of the "good ones" leaves...a brain drain, so to speak. Those left are often the aged, the infirm and others who are too stubborn to move on to better things. Even when I lived there in the 70's most all the young people left.
Without a growing industrial and wage and business base, you have descent into poverty and hopelessness...aka, the Opiate and Meth and Booze and disability thing.
It's hard to ask people in those situations to study their votes carefully. The leftover older populations are very much churchgoing or even evangelistic and the preacher tells them how to vote. They grab onto perceived cultural issues even though these really don't affect them at all....but they are mad at the world in a sense....
One must also keep in mind isolationist culture. The reason many people live there is they wanted to get away from what we call civilization...that's the "hatfield and McCoys" and the "Moonshiner" thing. They have always hated the government...and they have always been generally uneducated (in the traditional sense of the Western Enlightenment, Science, etc.).
Generalizations? Of course. I have a childhood friend who is a county commissioner in WV. My nephews wife is from WV and they live in coastal SC now and are very progressive and educated. My DIL's family lived in WV...but they escaped to Ohio and they told me they won't even go back to visit!
When people who are from there - working class - tell me they won't even go back to visit, that tells me something!
There is no more beautiful time /place than springtime in WVA.
One might be so stunned by the thousands of dogwood trees in bloom, throughout the Allegheny Mountains, one may not notice:
Highest percentage of SSDI recipients in the US. The economies of many counties are entirely dependent upon SSDI.
20% of population receives SNAP benefits. WVA was the first recipient of modern food stamps in 1961.
Highest rate of child obesity
Highest rate for teen pregnancy
Highest rate of tooth decay- Mountain Dew Mouth is real.
#1 for opiate/ opioid ODs in the US
Highest rate of babies born addicted to opiates/ opioids
Highest rate of adult smokers
10th place for per capita Obamacare subsidy
One of the highest unemployment rates in US
Median home value is $99,000, the cheapest in the US. The majority of the state is rural. Mortgages carry the highest interest rates in the US due to the credit scores of borrowers. No shortage of homes are crumbling from neglect.
15% of homes are mobile homes, the highest rate in the US.
History: Employment in the mines peaked nearly 100 years ago. Industrial robotics and competition from Right to Work western states took are huge toll, over time.
Despite near constant hard times and lack of indoor plumbing extended families clung to their shanties in the mountains and hollows. Extreme poverty has afflicted the area, since forever.
The LBJ War on Poverty began in WVA. Roads were built. . Enormous sums of Federal money poured into WVA for housing grants, no interest loans and indoor plumbing. It worked for a blip in time. Without jobs, life is not good. Those with education and/or skills or and/motivation got out.
I live in WV and I can guarantee you that I pay a lot in taxes also. I'm questioning the wisdom of condemning taxes but promoting the idea of owning land that is going to have very high property taxes.
I won't pretend to say that living on the Ohio River (to be factual, I live a couple block up from it) is as nice as living on the ocean but it's not so bad and it's far, far, far more affordable.
The only real point of the thread is that the OP is making some kind of claim that residents are "well off" in one fashion or another.....or they are doing better because land and housing is cheap.
Cheap land and housing is all fine (Pittsburgh is cheap too!).....but when a state is #1 in taking tax money and yet the state (in general) rallies against "welfare and socialism" , there is a bit of hypocrisy involved.
I always prefer the middle ground. I wouldn't want to live in the Bay Area or So. Cal, but I love the Bays and Oceans and Gulf of New England, Sarasota...and was raised not far from the NJ Shore (Ocean City, etc.).
If I was a young man and wanted to do the "back to the land" thing again (been there, done that), I'd hightail it up to the border of VA, WV and MD and look hard at some of those valleys. Heaven on Earth....of course, one would have to decide how to have a community of sorts (I'm not a churchgoer, which can make it tough in isolated places).
I remember one particular fall when we drove the winding roads headed over the passes into WV from VA (Likely from Lexington, VA on through). That particular year the leaves were giving a show that beat anything I ever saw in New England or anywhere else.
Right you are.
Dems cared - and still do - about Unions and stuff like that. Real advancements for working people.
But WV was - to put it simply - raped by corporate America and Europe (London). That's not the fault of any particular political party...it's a problem with our system that allows such crimes.
Hillary told the people that they were going to lose their jobs, but don't worry, we will step up the welfare. It did not go over very well.
Quote:
One thing leads to another. There are no jobs, so there are no (or few) Unions. This means there is not much money and therefore not many educational or development opportunities. So the population falls down instead of being lifted up. Many of the "good ones" leaves...a brain drain, so to speak. Those left are often the aged, the infirm and others who are too stubborn to move on to better things. Even when I lived there in the 70's most all the young people left.
Without a growing industrial and wage and business base, you have descent into poverty and hopelessness...aka, the Opiate and Meth and Booze and disability thing.
It's hard to ask people in those situations to study their votes carefully.
Here we go........methheads don't vote. The rest studied their votes.
Quote:
The leftover older populations are very much churchgoing or even evangelistic and the preacher tells them how to vote.
Again. It doesn't happen.
Quote:
They grab onto perceived cultural issues even though these really don't affect them at all....but they are mad at the world in a sense....
One must also keep in mind isolationist culture. The reason many people live there is they wanted to get away from what we call civilization...that's the "hatfield and McCoys" and the "Moonshiner" thing. They have always hated the government...and they have always been generally uneducated (in the traditional sense of the Western Enlightenment, Science, etc.).
Generalizations? Of course. I have a childhood friend who is a county commissioner in WV. My nephews wife is from WV and they live in coastal SC now and are very progressive and educated. My DIL's family lived in WV...but they escaped to Ohio and they told me they won't even go back to visit!
When people who are from there - working class - tell me they won't even go back to visit, that tells me something!
Yeah, that you are making stuff up. The only areas you "get away from civilization" is the very Southern part of the state and not all that many people live there.
I have family there and visit regularly. Yes, their property taxes are low. Their food and utilities ARE higher. The grocery store prices are crazy.
Their roads are sickening. I don’t mean just potholes. There are roads that are just collapsed on the sides. They’ll stick a cone by it and that’s how it stays. When it snows, kids are out of school for a week for a two inch snow. I’m not exaggerating. I’ve seen it. It wasn’t just one area. I’ve spent a lot of time in the northern and central regions of the state.
Speaking of schools, public education is crap. Third from the bottom in the country.
Go there, spend some time. You will see the difference in what those cheap property taxes get you. You get what you pay for. From what I’ve experienced in WV, people merely exist. Very few are truly living a good life.
I’ve lived in a few states, WV being one of them. It is definitely bottom of the list of desirability. NJ was the best, I thought. Super high taxes and has morphed into something I don’t even recognize anymore. VT was really nice but I don’t feel I lived there long enough to give a good and honest review of it.
Also lived in southern SC. Not awful but not for me. We actually lived pretty good there but not enough opportunity.
Now in northeastern PA. I fought this move. Hard. My only regret is not moving here sooner. My taxes here are equivalent to what I was paying in NJ for a home 2.5 times smaller in square footage and on a lot that was 80% smaller.
I have to wonder if the sheer percentage of homeowners in WV are largely inclusive of inherited homes or multigenerational homes. Both of which are very common. Nothing wrong with that. Don’t get me wrong, but would certainly skew the utopian image the homeowner statistic portrays.
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Location: Pine Grove,AL
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Quote:
Originally Posted by EastwardBound
Actually, places in the middle like Colorado are shining examples of American prosperity, however all states have a solid middle class and wealthy presence. I'm always surprised how ignorant people from places like New York are about places such as Alabama, where actually the majority of people have a more pleasant and more stable financial life than people in NYC for example.
You have 0 evidence to support that claim .
At best, all you can say is that, not everyone in Alabama is dirt poor, as some New Yorkers believe. But you cant claim financial stability either way.
Hillary told the people that they were going to lose their jobs, but don't worry, we will step up the welfare. It did not go over very well.
Yeah, that you are making stuff up. The only areas you "get away from civilization" is the very Southern part of the state and not all that many people live there.
I would ask you to study the history of the Scots-Irish and other settlers of WV.
If you haven't read it, read Night Comes to the Cumberlands. It's about a similar area and written in the 1960's.
When I say "get away", I am talking about the early days when indentured servants did their time in the east and then went over the passes and settled the hollows.
For about a buck there is no reason not to read it.
"It is apparent that such human refuse, dumped on a strange shore
in the keeping of a few hundred merciless planters, was incapable of
developing the kind of stable society under construction in the Puri-
tan North. Instead of the hymn-singing pilgrim to whom idleness
was the badge of shame, we must start with the cynical, the penni-
less, the resentful and the angry.
Others — and it is these with whom we are concerned — ran away to the interior"
"it is clear that the people who settled the Kentucky mountains
were not inspired Europeans determined to cross the dangerous
oceans and found a citadel of religious and economic freedom in
the New World. They were native North Americans with deeply
engrained mores, habits and social outlook. The Kentucky moun-
taineer, as a type, was already thoroughly established. He had
simply moved over a few hundred miles to find unplowed creek
bottoms, a more plentiful supply of game, and to get away from his
neighbors.
The migration into the virgin Kentucky mountain wilderness con-
tinued at a steady pace for about twenty-five years after 1787. Stead-
ily, the fresh valleys filled with people until about 1812, when the
flow of newcomers began to decline"
Note - it is written by one of them.....who became an attorney.....and was written before any of the current BS......
The only real point of the thread is that the OP is making some kind of claim that residents are "well off" in one fashion or another.....or they are doing better because land and housing is cheap.
"Doing better" is totally subjective. There is NO way to quantify that. There are people who do feel they are doing better when a traffic jam consists of 5 cars as opposed to sitting still on a freeway. It isn't anyone else's call. I also would not condemn those who believe doing better is living in a bustling city. I grew up in Cleveland Ohio. I miss some of the stuff still but it's a short trip.
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Cheap land and housing is all fine (Pittsburgh is cheap too!).....but when a state is #1 in taking tax money and yet the state (in general) rallies against "welfare and socialism" , there is a bit of hypocrisy involved.
Sanders beat Hillary in the (D) primaries. What was the rally cry here?
Quote:
I always prefer the middle ground. I wouldn't want to live in the Bay Area or So. Cal, but I love the Bays and Oceans and Gulf of New England, Sarasota...and was raised not far from the NJ Shore (Ocean City, etc.).
I was only in Ocean City once and thought it quite nice. Traffic seemed low for a "resort" town.
Quote:
If I was a young man and wanted to do the "back to the land" thing again (been there, done that), I'd hightail it up to the border of VA, WV and MD and look hard at some of those valleys. Heaven on Earth....of course, one would have to decide how to have a community of sorts (I'm not a churchgoer, which can make it tough in isolated places).
Nah. Learn to play an instrument. You'll find all kinds of people to hang out with but the area you note can be a good compromise. Still away from things but a very short drive to a big city or the ocean. (though land in that area is more expensive than other areas for that reason). People from D.C. buying it up.
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I remember one particular fall when we drove the winding roads headed over the passes into WV from VA (Likely from Lexington, VA on through). That particular year the leaves were giving a show that beat anything I ever saw in New England or anywhere else.
A beautiful drive most anytime of the year. As to your other post, I don't know what decades old history has to do with things today.
I have family there and visit regularly. Yes, their property taxes are low. Their food and utilities ARE higher. The grocery store prices are crazy.
No they aren't.
Quote:
Their roads are sickening. I don’t mean just potholes. There are roads that are just collapsed on the sides. They’ll stick a cone by it and that’s how it stays. When it snows, kids are out of school for a week for a two inch snow. I’m not exaggerating. I’ve seen it. It wasn’t just one area. I’ve spent a lot of time in the northern and central regions of the state.
Roads built on a mountain will indeed tend to slip from time to time.
Quote:
Speaking of schools, public education is crap. Third from the bottom in the country.
Misleading. I can guarantee that the education my kids got far exceeds that of many big city schools.
Quote:
Go there, spend some time. You will see the difference in what those cheap property taxes get you. You get what you pay for. From what I’ve experienced in WV, people merely exist. Very few are truly living a good life.
By your standards.
Quote:
I’ve lived in a few states, WV being one of them. It is definitely bottom of the list of desirability. NJ was the best, I thought. Super high taxes and has morphed into something I don’t even recognize anymore. VT was really nice but I don’t feel I lived there long enough to give a good and honest review of it.
Also lived in southern SC. Not awful but not for me. We actually lived pretty good there but not enough opportunity.
Now in northeastern PA. I fought this move. Hard. My only regret is not moving here sooner. My taxes here are equivalent to what I was paying in NJ for a home 2.5 times smaller in square footage and on a lot that was 80% smaller.
I have to wonder if the sheer percentage of homeowners in WV are largely inclusive of inherited homes or multigenerational homes. Both of which are very common. Nothing wrong with that. Don’t get me wrong, but would certainly skew the utopian image the homeowner statistic portrays.
The house I live in was bought by my wife's parents in the early 60's. They sold it and built a new house up the street. (her mom still lives there). The people who bought it sold it to my wife's grandparents around 25 years ago. (they were getting too old to remain on the farm). We bought it from her grandmother after her grandfather passed away and her grandmother got too old to take care of herself).
That is perhaps more common than other places but all the same..........we own it clear now, I have no desire to "move up" and it will make it so we both car retire at a decent age. (my wife retires at the end of the year at 55). I'll have to work another couple years.
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