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Red America is bad for your health. If you live in a red state, your risk of contracting and dying from covid-19 is higher than in the blue states. On average, your life expectancy is shorter, your chances of living in poverty higher, your educational attainment lower, and your economic opportunities reduced in relation to blue state residents.
Meanwhile, politicians in the red states have effectively told several American workers, high-tech companies and entrepreneurs to go elsewhere. They have suppressed the vote for minorities, they have targeted LGBTQ families, they have turned public education upside down with their panic at critical racial theory (although it is not taught in K-12 schools) and they have punished corporations that do not engage in discriminatory practices.
And then came the abortion bans. Thousands, if not millions, of women of childbearing age could reconsider their residence if they want to avoid prohibitions that could endanger their lives, or if they simply want to be treated as competent, self-sufficient adults.
There are indications that the reality of forced childbirth laws is being registered with those most affected. Reuters reports: “The decision of the United States Supreme Court in June to revoke in 1973 Roe against Wade The case that legalized abortion nationwide causes some students to rethink their higher education plans as states rush to ban or reduce abortion, according to interviews with 20 students and college counselors around the world. of the country. Although the evidence is anecdotal at this point, “below of Roe Instead, college counselors said abortion has taken a prominent place in many conversations with clients, and some even went so far as to nullify the schools of their dreams. “(Blue state state colleges may want to consider offering tuition to students seeking to escape misogyny in their home states.)
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Likewise, blue state employers know that they can offer employees something that red state companies can’t: guaranteeing personal physical autonomy. The New York Times reports:
For companies anchored in economically vibrant conservative states like Texas, Tennessee and Georgia, the decline of women’s rights is no longer a hypothetical scenario but an immediate challenge. It represents a potential disruption to the calculation that has made Republican-led Sun Belt states attractive to large corporations, which have tended to accept tax cuts and regulations while treating local social policy as a kind of secondary show.
The Times reports that blue state governors have begun to “present their abortion rights policies as a business advantage, reinforcing the appeal of the richer, more progressive states that many companies choose to call home. despite their taxes “. Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker (D) told the Times that his party must refine its message, arguing that President Biden and Democrats more broadly “should talk about this first as a matter of individual rights and freedoms, and secondly as an economic issue. ”
At least the Secretary of Commerce, Gina Raimondo, understands. As he discussed inflation and economic growth on NBC News’ “Meet the Press” on Sunday, he explained, “Look at the labor participation of women without a college degree. We need to be there for these women to take care of children, you know. , reproductive health is on everyone’s mind. This will hurt the economy. “
No one expects MAGA governors like Greg Abbott of Texas to suddenly recognize the connection between progressive social policies and economic success. He and his fellow advocates of forced births are more likely to demonize “awakened” companies that want to protect employees ’reproductive rights than to reconsider the economic implications of treating women as second-class citizens.
But the results may confirm that the MAGA cult ideology charges the red states in a variety of ways, from declining life expectancy to harassing women in the workplace to causing a “brain drain” while workers with university education they are heading towards the states of the 21st century. If that happens, it would not be the first time that the archaic social policies of the South have left him struggling to keep up with the more prosperous North. At some point, voters in the red states might realize that they are losing ground to the blue states.