A prominent policy expert wrote an editorial in The New York Times this week predicting that the recently passed Republican tax plan could result in a Democratic wave in 2020, if not this November.
Will Wilkinson, vice president for policy at the Niskanen Center, notes that the tax plan will make living in big cities in blue states, such as New York and Los Angeles, more expensive than they already are. And that will mean that many corporations will likely “deflect talented workers to relatively affordable red-state cities,” like Houston, Dallas, or even Amarillo.
Many of these workers will be Democratic voters. Thus, the tax cut will serve to “redistribute” liberal voters into more conservative states like Texas. And with the recent increase in minority voters in Texas, those extra workers could tip the scales into blue territory.
And Texas isn’t alone. Wilkinson predicts that “red states with high rates of domestic in-migration” such as Arizona, Georgia, North Carolina and Florida are very likely adding Democrats faster than Republicans.