OT: Mississippi population
- Thread starter Hoover Dawg
- Start date
- Status
On this topic, I've always wondered which is true and I want to know what y'all think, but
- Is MS poor because we are uneducated?
or
- Is MS uneducated because we are poor?
Being poor does not keep one from being able to learn. There`s a hell of a lot more to the educational problems in Mississippi than poverty alone.
You serious clark?
In the 60's Atlanta had a population of 480k and Birmingham about 380k.
Meridian's was 49k.
I know you're familiar with this but Florida also has doc stamps and intangible taxes that raise a lot of money for the state.
Mississippi spends quite a bit on education. The problem is the mismanagement of funds, corruption, and the ridiculous amounts of small school districts. If Desoto County can be one school district, other counties or regions can do the same.
You are correct. And there is a way to explain the discrepancy. In economics, its called PPP (purchasing power parity) and its used to compare the value of currency in one economy vs. a similar or different currency in another economy.
On that map, it's called regional price parities, but its the same thing as PPP. Essentially, you can see that $100 goes a good bit farther in MS than it does in Florida. And although MS does have a smaller per capita income, the difference in PPP is quite a good bit. So yeah, it's easier to live comfortably making less in MS than it is to live comfortably making less in FL.
Change the flag
Remove the stars and bars from the official state flag and you would be surprised how much that would change the image of the state, and present the state as more inviting to new residents and companies. Not a panacea by any means, but would be a great first step.
Remove the stars and bars from the official state flag and you would be surprised how much that would change the image of the state, and present the state as more inviting to new residents and companies. Not a panacea by any means, but would be a great first step.
You are exactly right, just not comprehensive. Another huge problem is the mindset of many, many parents who don't give a rats *** whether their children get an education or not. Until they change, their children are not going to attend school and behave and at least not disrupt the class and maybe try to learn a little bit. The old saying still goes, you can't take off the tops of their heads and pour the knowledge in. Ask any teacher out there what I am talking about and I'm sure they can give you lots of detail.
Meant to say 75-100 years ago, but yes. Just like much of MS, Meridian got in its own way. I'm sure you've been to downtown meridian, but it's nothing like town of similar size (Tupelo, Hattiesburg). It had wealth, education, and industry unlike those other places, as well. Now, Tupelo and Hattiesburg have left meridian in the dust. Meridian has zero tax base and downtown is all but abandoned.
If I were the King of Mississippi, I'd put oil rigs everywhere in the Sound
Not only would we be getting oil and gas revenue, but the rigs make for excellent fishing.
Not only would we be getting oil and gas revenue, but the rigs make for excellent fishing.
Dumb politicians(office holders) are the result of dumb voters.There, I said it.
The majority of voters can't tell you 5 stances (in detail) of their favorite office seeker.
Heck, some of the politicians who run for office can't detail 5 of their own stances.
The majority of voters can't tell you 5 stances (in detail) of their favorite office seeker.
Heck, some of the politicians who run for office can't detail 5 of their own stances.
MS is poor because generations on top of generations of poor people who have been barred from or discouraged from access to education resulting in a culture that doesn't value it.
This is pretty accurate. If we gave the entire Delta to Louisiana and Arkansas, Mississippi would certainly move out of last place in a lot of the major categories (education, income, poverty, etc.). We'd still be bottom 10 in one or two of them, but that part of the state has been absolutely destitute for multiple decades now.
Surely there is something that can be done out there. Hunting, tourism, something?
I assume you are talking about black people. But no, this isn't the issue either. The black folks that get an education move to Atlanta, so the retainage of population is still a problem.
There is a brain drain in MS. I'm just not certain if the brains are supposed to come back and create, or if you have to create to bring the brains back. If that makes sense.
On the surface, I think it goes back to Jackson not being a thriving place...
MS seems to be the only southern state that doesn't have ONE thriving urban area that attracts graduates with job opportunities and entertainment. If Jackson could make that turnaround, I think you would see it spread to other areas.
MS seems to be the only southern state that doesn't have ONE thriving urban area that attracts graduates with job opportunities and entertainment. If Jackson could make that turnaround, I think you would see it spread to other areas.
I completely agree with you in the brain drain, and that goes for all demographics, but MS
created its own issues in education through suppression for a century.
Think about this, I have very young children and my father's generation is the first to graduate high school with African American peers. As much as we like to talk about equality, we are not very far removed from oppression.
So what about the other southern states? Doesn't seem to have slowed their population growth.
Didn't B'ham's mayor get thrown in prison a few years back?
You really want to be like Atlanta?
Mississippi politicians have put zero emphasis on economic growth and investing in creating a new and inviting image to bring high quality jobs that demand a high quality workforce (which, on its own will help fix some of our education and economic problems) and, instead, are busy making sure we thumb our nose at everyone else for being wrong or liberal or whatever. Our state government is totally ok with us being dead last in everything.
If there was a governor and congress that got their heads out of the sand and really focused on image and economic development, it'd be huge. Unfortunately, voters wouldn't vote for someone who would focus on improvement.
If there was a governor and congress that got their heads out of the sand and really focused on image and economic development, it'd be huge. Unfortunately, voters wouldn't vote for someone who would focus on improvement.
Well, the subject on this particular side-thread was education and poverty. I was addressing why education isn't valued in a lot of homes in MS, and you will see that same pattern across other southern states. Generational poverty doesn't explain it all, but it's a big piece of the picture. MS happens to have ensured that a very large percentage of the population stayed in poverty for decades.
They are much better than what we have now, in Jackson. At the minimum, they are bigger, with bigger companies and greater revenue spread around.
Exactly. I contend more adjacent, low pop. counties should create multi-county..
school districts.
If you have 2, 3, etc. neighboring counties that have less than 20 (total) schools, they should merge into a single district. (Yes, I just picked '20' out of the air. I live in a school district with 29 schools.)
school districts.
If you have 2, 3, etc. neighboring counties that have less than 20 (total) schools, they should merge into a single district. (Yes, I just picked '20' out of the air. I live in a school district with 29 schools.)
Yes. I think weekly about moving back to Jackson since it is home. But I just cannot pull the trigger.
I tend to agree more with Desotocountydog and drt7891. That is not to say your point is not valid....it very much is. I just don't think your point is the reason we are seeing MS' population flatline.
A lot of people in MS seems to be OK with things the way they are, because they can control things. There again, the competition is very fierce.
Are you implying you are ok with what we have? Because I'm not OK with it. I'm not talking politically, I'm talking economically. I know plenty of people who live in the Birmingham and Atlanta areas because there are JOBS to be had. And good jobs, at that. Most are good people from Mississippi, but Mississippi can't provide them work, so they go to a place that can.
This is more of a side thread about poverty and education than population growth as a whole.
Now if you want to look at why the population doesn't grow, you are spot on. MS doesn't want to change. Politicians run a protectionist state that looks after the money and political power of those that have it already. They only allow economic growth on their terms and generally that means a piece of the action. Even the flag debate isn't really a racist debate at the core, it's a political power struggle.
Growth = outsiders with power = insiders with less of it. That's how you get Confederate History Month.
People don't like to recognize it, but a lot of it comes down to luck. Mississippi has combined plenty of bad choices to go with that bad luck, but Mississippi's leadership hasn't been particularly bad compared to other southeastern states.
There was a time where good leadership (and the population necessary to elect good leadership) could have made a difference. Now Mississippi's biggest problem is that we don't have a big population, which means we have fewer tickets to the lottery to get the type of business people that drive growth, and also means even if we are lucky enough to have a winning ticket, that person is more likely to cash it in in another state, or if they stay in state, they face more challenges by not having a large, local market.
Our leadership basically does a decent job now of making the state attractive to business, at least out of the things within their control. Tort reform worked, we have reasonably low taxes other than the franchise tax and for big business, we negate a lot of our bad policies with company specific tax breaks and incentives. Obviously had an own goal with the recent religious accommodation bill and there's not really anything that can be done about our work force (or at least not anything that anybody knows of since so many of the problems start early and at home).
I don't particularly like the way they throw incentives at individual companies and would prefer that they just focus on a good business environment for whoever is here (which would make it easier for homegrown companies), but overall, our main problem is that we're not an attractive place for business or people now because we weren't an attractive place for business or people 10, 20, 30, 40, etc. years ago.
There was a time where good leadership (and the population necessary to elect good leadership) could have made a difference. Now Mississippi's biggest problem is that we don't have a big population, which means we have fewer tickets to the lottery to get the type of business people that drive growth, and also means even if we are lucky enough to have a winning ticket, that person is more likely to cash it in in another state, or if they stay in state, they face more challenges by not having a large, local market.
Our leadership basically does a decent job now of making the state attractive to business, at least out of the things within their control. Tort reform worked, we have reasonably low taxes other than the franchise tax and for big business, we negate a lot of our bad policies with company specific tax breaks and incentives. Obviously had an own goal with the recent religious accommodation bill and there's not really anything that can be done about our work force (or at least not anything that anybody knows of since so many of the problems start early and at home).
I don't particularly like the way they throw incentives at individual companies and would prefer that they just focus on a good business environment for whoever is here (which would make it easier for homegrown companies), but overall, our main problem is that we're not an attractive place for business or people now because we weren't an attractive place for business or people 10, 20, 30, 40, etc. years ago.
That's pretty much accurate. The casinos (probably rightly) believe that a lottery will compete with them. Between baptist opposition nad casino opposition, it's pretty much DOA in the legislature.
Mississippi took the longest to escape the Democrat Party. Hell I think we've only had a GOP governor AND both chambers since only 2012.
That is a fact some of you heartedly ignore. Can't fix 130 years of damage overnight.
That is a fact some of you heartedly ignore. Can't fix 130 years of damage overnight.
That would require an educated population. An educated population might get ideas of it's own, such as un-electing these idiots that presently govern us. A lowly educated population is easier to control. Our politicians don't want people who think well, just mindless robots who'll go out and perform what few jobs they manage to entice here.
it seems to me that our political leadership has an attitude of "we're just po' lil ol Mississippi and we'll be happy to take whatever you can give us at whatever cost we need to pay" Just look at the incentives we throw at some of these big business to get them here. Try suggesting a bond issue on educational funding or maybe road improvement and folks raise holy hell. Bond issues to lure big business - not a peep. Even though we taxpayers are the ones on the hook for paying these bonds off.
Again, the educated population seems all too eager to leave the state. It's a catch-22.
We need innovation, not conformity. What works for the other southern states may not work for us. To me, a couple of things are obvious:
- Elected leaders need to be pro-growth
- Need to stop passing unneeded laws
- Need to improve our urban metro areas
Those are obvious and can be controlled. What can't be controlled is how you breed innovation within the state. Somebody is going to have to come up with something, and make a sacrifice. I had this wild eyed idea about a huge, linked tourism trail, combining the blues trail, civil rights, casinos, golf courses, food, outdoors, etc. I think many folks around the country would be interested in the history of Mississippi, even if it paints us in a bad light. And they'd pay money to do it. We would have to shed our thin skin, though, when it comes to said history.
Last edited:
Much of that may reflect the fall of U.S. Ag, which affected Mississippi so negatively since we invested so heavily into it. It is not always the politicians fault. One thing is for certain, we must do something long-term with the Delta, and I don't mean casinos.
Legalization of MJ would be a great start.
It would instantly make the Delta one of the wealthiest agricultural regions in country. It would be MJ nearly exclusively because of the perfect climate.
The Midwest would still be stuck growing corn and beans.
It would instantly make the Delta one of the wealthiest agricultural regions in country. It would be MJ nearly exclusively because of the perfect climate.
The Midwest would still be stuck growing corn and beans.
I don't think it's a democrat/GOP issue. Our GOP congress just had one of the most controversial sessions in our states history while basically accomplishing nothing of real substance. The biggest problem, to me, lies in the fact that no one seems to want to focus on changing the image of our state (whatever that may take) to lure good businesses to want to set up shop here. Good business demand a good work force. A good work force demands good compensation, which means a lot in generating a stronger local economy (also increased tax revenues so small Towns don't have to starve local businesses to fix roads and schools). That also brings higher-caliber students into our education systems, which can do wonders to our education system.
It all starts with jobs. Jobs jobs jobs. Give people a reason to move here and spend their money here and send their kids to our schools. That goes well beyond a democrat/republican issue, to me. It's a competence issue.
It all starts with jobs. Jobs jobs jobs. Give people a reason to move here and spend their money here and send their kids to our schools. That goes well beyond a democrat/republican issue, to me. It's a competence issue.
Do you think Ross Barnett would be a Democrat today? You might want to google "Southern Strategy" if you are are wondering where the lineage of the old MS Democrat Party is now.
Another hint:
View attachment 4266
The point is, the "old Democrats" are still running the show, they just wear a different jersey now.
If nothing changes, nothing changes.
- Status
Latest
-
01
Rivals Basketball Recruiting
4-star center Chris Brown commits to Mississippi State
-
02
Maroon and White Football
Mississippi State Week 11 Preview: Auburn Q and A
-
03
Maroon and White Basketball
Mississippi State vs. Xavier: How, Where, and When to Watch Bulldog Basketball
-
04
Maroon and White
"I started something I didn't finish": Mississippi State QB Kamario Taylor joins Sports Center to talk 2027 return
-
05
Maroon and White Basketball
Bulldogs prepare to level up competition, starting with Xavier in neutral site meeting