Why are Texans moving to Montana and other northern states?

[rynetwo]

Originally Posted by DillyDilly97

Crazy high property taxes, a weak public school system, lack of public land and parks, whole state is turning into one giant suburb (including West Texas now), lack of water and the state is drying up. Huge influx of Native Texans now moving to places like Tennessee/Georgia/Kentucky/Northern Arkansas/Southern Indiana. People are tired of the heat, traffic, crowds and lack of nature. They are moving to places that actually have four seasons and are cheaper to live in on top of that with an abundance of public land.

When considering the demographics provided, Texas public schools demonstrate strong performance. For families that fall within the working to middle-class bracket and maintain active parental involvement, children have the potential to thrive in most districts across the state. It’s important to recognize the role that socioeconomic factors and family support play in educational outcomes.

As for taxes:

State-Local Tax Burden as a Share of State Income

Rank (lower number is better)

• Tennessee - 3 @ 7.6%
• Texas - 4 @ 8.6%
• Indiana - 14 @ 9.3%
• Kentucky - 17 @ 9.6%
• Arkansas - 26 @ 10.2%

See table 2.

Source: chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/https://taxfoundation.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Facts-and-Figures-How-Does-Your-State-Compare-Tax-Foundation-2.pdf

Finally, raw number domestic/international/total population change from 2021-2022:

• Texas - +230,961/118,614/470,708
• Tennessee - +81,646/8,096/82,988
• Indiana - +5,230/15,490/19,505
• Arkansas - +18,209/3,314/17,515
• Kentucky - +10,420/4,455/5,721

Source: United States Census Bureau
Link: https://trerc.tamu.edu/data/populati...ta-State=Texas

Maybe because of the sheer number of Texans, you are seeing them everywhere?

[EDS_]

Originally Posted by rynetwo

When considering the demographics provided, Texas public schools demonstrate strong performance. For families that fall within the working to middle-class bracket and maintain active parental involvement, children have the potential to thrive in most districts across the state. It’s important to recognize the role that socioeconomic factors and family support play in educational outcomes.

As for taxes:

State-Local Tax Burden as a Share of State Income

Rank (lower number is better)

• Tennessee - 3 @ 7.6%
• Texas - 4 @ 8.6%
• Indiana - 14 @ 9.3%
• Kentucky - 17 @ 9.6%
• Arkansas - 26 @ 10.2%

See table 2.

Source: chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/https://taxfoundation.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Facts-and-Figures-How-Does-Your-State-Compare-Tax-Foundation-2.pdf

Finally, raw number domestic/international/total population change from 2021-2022:

• Texas - +230,961/118,614/470,708
• Tennessee - +81,646/8,096/82,988
• Indiana - +5,230/15,490/19,505
• Arkansas - +18,209/3,314/17,515
• Kentucky - +10,420/4,455/5,721

Source: United States Census Bureau
Link: https://trerc.tamu.edu/data/populati...ta-State=Texas

Maybe because of the sheer number of Texans, you are seeing them everywhere?

People iike that are not reachable with facts.

[DillyDilly97]

Originally Posted by EDS_

People iike that are not reachable with facts.

Keep telling yourself that and never live outside your little bubble. Go live in the other places being mentioned and spend some time there. Quit being a Homer. The way Texas complains about being flooded by West Coasters, numerous other States are complaining the same way about being flooded by Texans moving there. Numbers don’t lie, but then again sometimes they do. They tell part of a story, not a complete story.

[Trainwreck20]

Originally Posted by DillyDilly97

Keep telling yourself that and never live outside your little bubble. Go live in the other places being mentioned and spend some time there. Quit being a Homer. The way Texas complains about being flooded by West Coasters, numerous other States are complaining the same way about being flooded by Texans moving there. Numbers don’t lie, but then again sometimes they do. They tell part of a story, not a complete story.

Texas schools are actually generally pretty good. Rankings generally have them 'middle of the pack', but many of the rankings that have them on the lower-end include $/student as a ranking criteria. I.e if two states had schools with all other criteria equal (graduation rate, test scores, whatever) but one spent twice as much money per student, then it would score much better in the rankings.

[rabbit33]

Originally Posted by Trainwreck20

Texas schools are actually generally pretty good. Rankings generally have them 'middle of the pack', but many of the rankings that have them on the lower-end include $/student as a ranking criteria. I.e if two states had schools with all other criteria equal (graduation rate, test scores, whatever) but one spent twice as much money per student, then it would score much better in the rankings.

Well, lumping "Texas schools" together is a load of hooey anyway. Each school district is its own entity and for that matter for large districts individual schools vary wildly. There's simply no way you can throw Highland Park ISD into the same bucket as the underfunded schools in the Valley and get a meaningful result. If you want to make statements like "Massachusetts schools are better than Texas schools" then I'll invite you to compare Brockton to Plano.

What we're seeing all over the US is a flight of people from areas that are increasingly expensive and dysfunctional to places they believe are less expensive and better run. For Californians that's Texas. For Texans that's Oklahoma and Montana (among others). Even within Texas we see a dramatic movement away from large corrupt cities with their ridiculous property taxes and ballooning housing prices to smaller cities and semi-rural areas, aided of course by the ability of many to work from home, and further pushed by the numbers of Baby Boomers who're reaching or getting close to retirement age. I'm sure that in other states with a few large dysfunctional cities there's a similar move, for example California, Illinois, Michigan, etc.

[Trainwreck20]

Not sure there are 'dramatic' movement away from the large cities - they are still growing at a 1 to 2% rate per year (Austin was 2.3% and was the highest, I think). The state growth rate is right around that range, so not a huge difference. There has been a very slight shift - about one percent - to rural over the past few years, likely enabled by Covid - but some of that is actually shifting back to 'urban' because of the growth - i.e. Kyle, Buda, Dripping Springs were all rural in the past 20 years but are now in the 'urban' or 'urban cluster' category.

Anecdotally, we have looked at moving to somewhere 'rural' in Colorado for many years now. We tend to spend a good bit of time up there in the summer and a smaller amount of time in the winter. In any case, it was interesting to see the 'Covid price spike' in the small towns (Leadville, Fairplay, Kremmling) and the more recent collapse of prices in those same places. People have an image of what they are going to get, but then reality turns out to be very different. I suspect that would be the Montana thing, as well, as many will find out it isn't quite what they expected.

Finally, is the question even accurate. According to a Montana newspaper:

- Texas is the 12th most common state of origin for new residents

- 1,357 people moved to Montana from Texas in 2022, making up 2.82% of new residents that moved from another state

- It was the #44 most common state for people moving away from Texas

So, basically, someone leaving Texas was more likely to move to one of 43 other states. It may look like a lot, but 1,357 people leaving TX and moving to MT is really almost in the noise level.

WA: 5225
CA: 4660
OR: 3691
CO: 3440
UT: 2570
AZ: 2415
ID: 2244
FL: 1993
ND: 1540 (wth, this is a huge percent of ND! Seriously, 0.2% of ND moved to MT)
NC: 1507
WI: 1436

[Ilovetexas98]

I would rather just escape the Texas triangle than try to move to a whole nother state.

[rabbit33]

[quote=Trainwreck20;66764898]Not sure there are 'dramatic' movement away from the large cities - they are still growing at a 1 to 2% rate per year (Austin was 2.3% and was the highest, I think). The state growth rate is right around that range, so not a huge difference. There has been a very slight shift - about one percent - to rural over the past few years, likely enabled by Covid - but some of that is actually shifting back to 'urban' because of the growth - i.e. Kyle, Buda, Dripping Springs were all rural in the past 20 years but are now in the 'urban' or 'urban cluster' category....[\QUOTE\]

Thing is, you're looking at net city population changes. Existing residents are fleeing the biggest cities and new residents are moving into them. The ones fleeing are going to rural areas in TX and to other states. You can ask anyone in, for example, Smith, Van Zandt, Henderson, or Kaufman counties what's happening to their rural counties.