What is "Oregon" (Portland, Medford: houses, income, to live)

[ComfortablyNumb]

Maybe this has been answered before. Since I am thinking about moving there, I am just wondering what Oregon essentially is.

I'm from Wisconsin, and I just have this feeling that Oregon is sort of like a west coast, smaller Wisconsin. Economically, Wisconsin is pretty diverse, but still just mediocre and crappy compared to a lot of other similarly sized states. Isn't Oregon kinda the same? Here in Wisconsin, there are a LOT of companies that have hundreds of employees all getting paid $9-10/h, such as in warehouses or factories or call centers, but very few employers that have a large number of workers in professional jobs, like in Minnesota.

Wisconsin people are known for being hard working, sort of "simple folk" who get home from a hard day at work and eat steak, watch football, and don't really care about materialistic stuff. We really have our own identity, like Texans. Anyway, isn't Oregon kind of similar? Or kind of not at all?

[EnricoV]

Wow. Way to pile on the compliments in order to get a response. No, I don't consider anything about Oregon "mediocre and crappy." So I guess Wisconsin wins on that one.

Smaller? Oregon is about 150% larger in land mass, but has about 66% the population. I'm not sure that makes us smaller. Landwise, Oregon is more diverse than Wisconsin. We have mountains, cities, farms, Shakespeare, beaches, forests, deserts, cowboys, glaciers, and lumberjacks. So depending on where you're talking about in Oregon, the "identity" will differ greatly.

[jread]

I am from a huge, largely urban state (TX) that has a ton of variety and a strong self-identity, so I think I can comment here.

To me, Oregonians seemed to live life at a slower pace and were very mild-tempered and content with their lives. There is not a push there to be "bigger and better" or to outdo everyone around you. I came away with the impression that they were very proud of their beautiful state and were happy to live a simple life there, appreciating the world around them. It was a much more calm and relaxing lifestyle than what I'm used to in Texas' rat race of madness. Even here in Austin, which is considered a "laid back" city, people are very busy and always pushing to achieve as much as they possibly can (driving fast, building fast, eating fast... everything is full-speed ahead). In Oregon, it was as if people recognized that they had a good life and lived in a wonderful place, and were damn well happy enough with that. I really do think that I would live a lot longer and have much less stress in my life if I lived there

[juliempdx]

Originally Posted by ComfortablyNumb

Maybe this has been answered before. Since I am thinking about moving there, I am just wondering what Oregon essentially is.

I'm from Wisconsin, and I just have this feeling that Oregon is sort of like a west coast, smaller Wisconsin. Economically, Wisconsin is pretty diverse, but still just mediocre and crappy compared to a lot of other similarly sized states. Isn't Oregon kinda the same? Here in Wisconsin, there are a LOT of companies that have hundreds of employees all getting paid $9-10/h, such as in warehouses or factories or call centers, but very few employers that have a large number of workers in professional jobs, like in Minnesota.

Wisconsin people are known for being hard working, sort of "simple folk" who get home from a hard day at work and eat steak, watch football, and don't really care about materialistic stuff. We really have our own identity, like Texans. Anyway, isn't Oregon kind of similar? Or kind of not at all?

I would hardly call Oregon a "factory worker" state! I am a native Oregonian and agree with what jread said. However Oregon has lost a lot of it's idenity because lets face it there really aren't many people left there that are originally from here. I would describe Oregon as being a state where the majority of the population deeply appreciates the landscape and make an effort to take care of it.

[Barleysoda]

Originally Posted by juliempdx

However Oregon has lost a lot of it's idenity because lets face it there really aren't many people left there that are originally from here.

this is exactly right!

[EnricoV]

In my experience, that is not true. Granted, I'm old. But most everyone I know is a native. And that's just in the Portland area. Which we all know will have the highest percentage of non-natives. Anyone I know who is non-native came here so long ago, it's just a technicality.

But of course, I had to look up some facts and figures. So here's a quote from a study using figures from PSU's Population Research Center:

More than half (54%) of all residents were born outside Oregon. Of those who were not born in Oregon, nearly two-thirds have lived in Oregon for at least ten years. Nearly three out of four Oregon residents were either native born or have lived in the state for at least 20 years. Of the recent in-migrants who moved to Oregon in the last five years, California was the source for nearly 28% of the in-migrants.

If 75% of residents had lived in Oregon for at least 20 years ... to me, it doesn't matter where they're born. They might as well be native.

[Renilou]

Originally Posted by ComfortablyNumb

Maybe this has been answered before. Since I am thinking about moving there, I am just wondering what Oregon essentially is.

I'm from Wisconsin, and I just have this feeling that Oregon is sort of like a west coast, smaller Wisconsin. Economically, Wisconsin is pretty diverse, but still just mediocre and crappy compared to a lot of other similarly sized states. Isn't Oregon kinda the same? Here in Wisconsin, there are a LOT of companies that have hundreds of employees all getting paid $9-10/h, such as in warehouses or factories or call centers, but very few employers that have a large number of workers in professional jobs, like in Minnesota.

Wisconsin people are known for being hard working, sort of "simple folk" who get home from a hard day at work and eat steak, watch football, and don't really care about materialistic stuff. We really have our own identity, like Texans. Anyway, isn't Oregon kind of similar? Or kind of not at all?

Yes, it sounds like Oregon. I have lived there all my life , un until 3 years ago and I am moving back this year to be closer to all my family. I've lived North, East, South, West and Central Oregon. There are people there of all income levels. Most are hard working ranchers, dairy farmers and so forth. Oregon still has allot of timber, and have been replanting for 50 years. None in taken without 20 more planted for every one taken. I know, I had a timber ranch for almost 15 years. The Public lands are required by law to replant and the private land owners are given a little bonus for replanting. Even with all this. The environmental groups have shut down the timber industry, not realizing that some of our trees like alder and cottonwood grow like weeds in Oregon. This state has really gone down hill since the shut down of timber ranching because it was our main number 1 resource.
There is not allot of work left in Oregon. A very depressed economy there.

[backdrifter]

Originally Posted by EnricoV

In my experience, that is not true. Granted, I'm old. But most everyone I know is a native. And that's just in the Portland area. Which we all know will have the highest percentage of non-natives. Anyone I know who is non-native came here so long ago, it's just a technicality.

False. Bend and Medford have the highest percentages of non-natives and they ARE from California. The largest numbers of non-natives move to Portland, however, and most of those are not from California.

To respond to the OP... That is definitely NOT how Oregon is at all. Oregon is much better than pretty much every other state (nevermind our state's perpetually bleak economy) and I think Oregonians, for the most part, know it.

People here are either in low paying customer service jobs or... I honestly don't know how Oregonians make any money or how we have an economy at all to be honest. I wouldn't call us simple folk at all, however, except in that we are not very materialistic generally speaking. There are next to no factories, call centers, warehouses, or anything like that here.

That's not what Oregon is about. Oregon is about our rivers and mountains and forests and coast and prairies and grasslands and basins and valleys and gorges. It's about our way of life.