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Is there any chance Puerto Rico could gain independence from the U.S. Do many Puerto Ricans desire independence or do they prefer to be a territory...with the perks...
We prefer to keep the status quo. If anything, some prefer it to be another state, except that it will take the name away from Mississippi, as the most poorer one. Puerto Rico is a very small island with very few natural resources. We are wayyy overpopulated. What we will gain by becoming independent? There are people who may want it , but most of us do not.
I don't know if people in PR realize the fact that with their high population count PR will gain a significant number of electoral votes. To be specific, in today's close elections PR would play a huge role. Also, having a say in the Senate and the House could bring more money to PR. Who knows, maybe there would be enough pork to build a bridge between Florida and PR, just ask Palin . I don't agree that PR and Mississippi are comparable. PR has much more potential that Mississippi and with more fiscal support and oversight from the mainland, it would climb ranks among the other states. Reason for this hypothesis is an example of many Eastern European nations that joined the EU. Many of these nations have been considerably less off than their western neighbors, and now their economies are becoming stronger and quality of life has improved dramatically. Some say that after becoming a state PR would become another Hawaii. First, Hawaii is better off than Mississippi. Second, PR and Hawaii are drastically different is almost every respect.
I wonder what other fellow bloggers feel about this.
I don't know if people in PR realize the fact that with their high population count PR will gain a significant number of electoral votes. To be specific, in today's close elections PR would play a huge role. Also, having a say in the Senate and the House could bring more money to PR. Who knows, maybe there would be enough pork to build a bridge between Florida and PR, just ask Palin . I don't agree that PR and Mississippi are comparable. PR has much more potential that Mississippi and with more fiscal support and oversight from the mainland, it would climb ranks among the other states. Reason for this hypothesis is an example of many Eastern European nations that joined the EU. Many of these nations have been considerably less off than their western neighbors, and now their economies are becoming stronger and quality of life has improved dramatically. Some say that after becoming a state PR would become another Hawaii. First, Hawaii is better off than Mississippi. Second, PR and Hawaii are drastically different is almost every respect.
I wonder what other fellow bloggers feel about this.
Um, I come from a pro-statehood family, but even I must recognize the reasons PR will never become a state and the intricacies that make such a proposition a pipedream. PR and Mississippi are must certainly comparable. PR is a densely populated island, with a lot of brain drain going on. There are more second generation PR folk in the mainland than there are Puerto Ricans in the island. Mississippi has a problem with education levels and industry, which is exactly the same as Puerto Rico's problem. PR doesn't need to become a state to derive tax incentives to bring industries in, but PR has a TOUGH case to pitch to Corporate America when it comes to production costs given that doing business in an island increases costs across the board. Mississippi has a boatload of land and the mainland connectivity of being inside the continental US, putting it at a much greater advantage than Puerto Rico from a business perspective.
Look, the business model has been tried before. The only reason leading edge industry would invest in Puerto Rico is for the tax advantage, but that's not really an advantage to Puerto Rico long-term, which is why it went away (google seccion 936). As to federal funding, PR is the poster child for welfare state and consumption junction. It's the epitomy of a false service-based economy with the number #1 employer being the government and its highest operating cost being payroll.
As to the HI comparison, Hawaii ain't doing that great either on that [economic] front, the main industry is tourism, and as a state, HI has the highest percentage of government contribution to the gross state product (21%) when compared to the other 49. This is NOT a coincidence; PR would MIRROR HI's economic architecture to a T if it would become a state, and if there is something PR would surpass above HI it would be government employment numbers. Not exactly a case for positives. Puerto Rico has way more competition than HI on the tourism front, and as opposed to Hawaii's economic identity, Puerto Ricans in the island do not view themselves as this tourism-slaved populace of warm welcoming servants, they view themselves as entitled american citizens above the caribbean froth, deserving of high tech and cubicle jobs in spite of the clear absence of indsutry to support such an entitlement, which is WHY most educated people are employed in government pushing paper, or (such as myself) left for the mainland. Good bad or indifferent, that is the reality for the educated class in PR, which is still the minority per capita when compared to the 50 states. So yes, I too would like to see PR become a state and shed its colonial false national identity shackles that keep most people down there DUMB and dispossessed, but I do not tout it as the automatic economic salvation of the island. Furthermore, from a mainlander perspective I can come up with a dozen economic reasons why it doesn't make sense to incorporate the island into the union. The entitlements would go through the roof under congressional voting power, and in the end that will do nothing to help the rest of the country. Selfish? Perhaps, but it's the economic truth.
So let's do the math. A population with cultural and national identity hangups kept ignorant by the minority burgeouise class that pushes the national identity agenda on the indigent (i.e. the whole damn island) and an American Congress with 2,057 freggin' economic incentives from both parties to NOT touch that subject with a 10-foot pole, and 100 years of historical inertia thrown in there for good measure...equals PR statehood AND independence as a pipedream. The island's timing to do the statehood thing was late 40s and 1950 at the most, they missed their chance, HI didn't.
Independence will never happen. Economically it would be a disaster, and PR is ALREADY an economic disaster. This rubs some pro-independence people down there the wrong way, but they have their neighbor to argue that; most people would do a re-enactment of the fall of Saigon the second that island becomes independent. Those days are over, the island will never become independent, it will remain a colony in my estimation. Statehood would be economically marginally beneficial to the island, but it wouldn't save it from its ills overnight. Problem is that most people in the CONUS have NO incentives to make PR the 51st state and do recognize the average's Puerto Rican's national identity sentiment of ambiguity, which reinforces the idea that they don't want it. It's just not gonna happen. The best a person from PR can hope for is to attain a competitive education to jump ship to the mainland like I did, or remain in the island and accept the opportunity cost of residing in a colony of the US.
hindsight2020, you make it sound that the only way to change things is to have a revolt! In all seriousness, the bigger and clunkier the government is the easier it is to take down. Perhaps in few more years the government of PR will become so inflated that it will collapse under its own weight and then it will be replaced by something that will be better for the people of Puerto Rico.
Um, I come from a pro-statehood family, but even I must recognize the reasons PR will never become a state and the intricacies that make such a proposition a pipedream. PR and Mississippi are must certainly comparable. PR is a densely populated island, with a lot of brain drain going on. There are more second generation PR folk in the mainland than there are Puerto Ricans in the island. Mississippi has a problem with education levels and industry, which is exactly the same as Puerto Rico's problem. PR doesn't need to become a state to derive tax incentives to bring industries in, but PR has a TOUGH case to pitch to Corporate America when it comes to production costs given that doing business in an island increases costs across the board. Mississippi has a boatload of land and the mainland connectivity of being inside the continental US, putting it at a much greater advantage than Puerto Rico from a business perspective.
Look, the business model has been tried before. The only reason leading edge industry would invest in Puerto Rico is for the tax advantage, but that's not really an advantage to Puerto Rico long-term, which is why it went away (google seccion 936). As to federal funding, PR is the poster child for welfare state and consumption junction. It's the epitomy of a false service-based economy with the number #1 employer being the government and its highest operating cost being payroll.
As to the HI comparison, Hawaii ain't doing that great either on that [economic] front, the main industry is tourism, and as a state, HI has the highest percentage of government contribution to the gross state product (21%) when compared to the other 49. This is NOT a coincidence; PR would MIRROR HI's economic architecture to a T if it would become a state, and if there is something PR would surpass above HI it would be government employment numbers. Not exactly a case for positives. Puerto Rico has way more competition than HI on the tourism front, and as opposed to Hawaii's economic identity, Puerto Ricans in the island do not view themselves as this tourism-slaved populace of warm welcoming servants, they view themselves as entitled american citizens above the caribbean froth, deserving of high tech and cubicle jobs in spite of the clear absence of indsutry to support such an entitlement, which is WHY most educated people are employed in government pushing paper, or (such as myself) left for the mainland. Good bad or indifferent, that is the reality for the educated class in PR, which is still the minority per capita when compared to the 50 states. So yes, I too would like to see PR become a state and shed its colonial false national identity shackles that keep most people down there DUMB and dispossessed, but I do not tout it as the automatic economic salvation of the island. Furthermore, from a mainlander perspective I can come up with a dozen economic reasons why it doesn't make sense to incorporate the island into the union. The entitlements would go through the roof under congressional voting power, and in the end that will do nothing to help the rest of the country. Selfish? Perhaps, but it's the economic truth.
So let's do the math. A population with cultural and national identity hangups kept ignorant by the minority burgeouise class that pushes the national identity agenda on the indigent (i.e. the whole damn island) and an American Congress with 2,057 freggin' economic incentives from both parties to NOT touch that subject with a 10-foot pole, and 100 years of historical inertia thrown in there for good measure...equals PR statehood AND independence as a pipedream. The island's timing to do the statehood thing was late 40s and 1950 at the most, they missed their chance, HI didn't.
Independence will never happen. Economically it would be a disaster, and PR is ALREADY an economic disaster. This rubs some pro-independence people down there the wrong way, but they have their neighbor to argue that; most people would do a re-enactment of the fall of Saigon the second that island becomes independent. Those days are over, the island will never become independent, it will remain a colony in my estimation. Statehood would be economically marginally beneficial to the island, but it wouldn't save it from its ills overnight. Problem is that most people in the CONUS have NO incentives to make PR the 51st state and do recognize the average's Puerto Rican's national identity sentiment of ambiguity, which reinforces the idea that they don't want it. It's just not gonna happen. The best a person from PR can hope for is to attain a competitive education to jump ship to the mainland like I did, or remain in the island and accept the opportunity cost of residing in a colony of the US.
We prefer to keep the status quo. If anything, some prefer it to be another state, except that it will take the name away from Mississippi, as the most poorer one. Puerto Rico is a very small island with very few natural resources. We are wayyy overpopulated. What we will gain by becoming independent? There are people who may want it , but most of us do not.
I think New Mexico is up there in terms of poverty too.
Why would Puerto Rico want to become an independent country? Many people have said that it's poor by stateside standards; but it is very well-off when you compare it to the rest of the Caribbean and Latin America. And of course their economy isn't doing to good right now, it's linked to ours!
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Independence
. I don't agree that PR and Mississippi are comparable. PR has much more potential that Mississippi and with more fiscal support and oversight from the mainland, it would climb ranks among the other states. Reason for this hypothesis is an example of many Eastern European nations that joined the EU. Many of these nations have been considerably less off than their western neighbors, and now their economies are becoming stronger and quality of life has improved dramatically. Some say that after becoming a state PR would become another Hawaii. First, Hawaii is better off than Mississippi. Second, PR and Hawaii are drastically different is almost every respect.
