Must-Read: Mark Yzaguirre: Texas Has Prospered In Spite of Social Conservatism, Not Because of It

Must-Read: Mark Yzaguirre: Texas Has Prospered In Spite of Social Conservatism, Not Because of It: “My normal response when I hear people… criticizing Texas is… to try and find a way to defend or at least explain it…

…Governor Greg Abbott… Twitter… ‘NY led way in taxes, regulations, union abuses, high living costs & how New Yorkers are fleeing to TX’. This is a nonresponsive and utterly unsatisfactory answer from Governor Abbott. The New York ad talks about human rights, not regulatory policy and taxes. I would agree that those items are of great importance when it comes to fostering a business-friendly environment and I probably have views closer to Governor Abbott’s on such points than many of my fellow Democrats. They aren’t the only issues that matter, however. Culture, legal protections for individuals and quality of life are also big drivers for development and it’s no accident that the parts of Texas where most of the wealth is generated and prosperity is centered are its more socially progressive cities….

Business leaders in Texas, even those who might otherwise lean Republican, seem to understand that revanchist social conservatism doesn’t work well if you want to encourage educated and tolerant people to move to and stay in your city and state…. One wonders if Texas’s reputation as a bastion of a certain sort of intolerant social conservatism hurts it economically in the long run and it’s hard to find evidence that it has ever been helpful…. The Texas of the future is not the Texas that supports anti-LGBT policies and other retrograde ideas that are indefensible on general principle and do nothing to make anyone’s life better. In this one case, it was appropriate for New York to mess with Texas.