Survive, yes. Thrive? Don't know about all that.
But at this point, survival might be enough.
Wall Street Journal Wrecks Mississippi
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But at this point, survival might be enough.
Just need a few more tax cuts, more restrictions on abortions, easier access to guns and maybe put the rebel flag back on the state flag. We need more politicians holding guns and shooting them in political ads. Entrepreneurs and young, educated people with social capital will follow. We'll get another Buccee's or two.
There’s untapped potential for industry across the entire state because of the coast, interstates, and the river. It’s there but you’ve got to have something to draw it in.
Jackson has a crime problem. Mississippi has an image problem. Fixing those things won't be easy but are necessary.
and Mississippi doesn't have a lot of working age folks that want to work either........
i hear there's an overabundance of deer in the state. if you can have a huge poultry industry, why not a deer processing industry? rainwater industry?
I like a lot of what you’re saying but I have questions about your Number 3 point:
1. It’s a move done by a lot of state and local EDAs as we know so it’s one that’s fairly common. So what else do we add to the table with that to differentiate ourselves from other EDAs? Do we coordinate with other states?
2. How do we provide the workforce the companies want? We both know that it’s difficult to provide the educated/trained folks that the corporations need. We could go the tried-and-true JUCO route. But is that enough?
3. It’s relatively easy to initially convince people to move here. But how do we keep them?
Infrastructure may not be the best word to encompass everything I’m saying. Hernando certainly has an infrastructure problem, but with the amount of families moving further south in the county, there’s just not enough development south of 269 currently to support living down there. You have Hernando - that’s steadily getting overcrowded but if you live south of Lewisburg HS it’s pretty dead. I’m sure they’ll eventually build grocery stores, etc. and it’ll make more sense.
What’d I like to know is how many of them are 45+ year old working age folks like me who’ve been let go or elected to retire from the state but decided if they do anything that they’re just do part time gigs when and if needed.
One of my high school classmates was let go from his old job just before Covid but saved up enough money to live for several years without working. Now he’s decided to go job hunting again.
From what I’ve seen there’s a lot of things being planned for Hernando and Lewisburg. It’s coming.
This is true. Fix Jackson and fix Mississippi. Unfortunately it's a near impossible situation.
We have a city that either doesn't want to be helped, or only wants help in which Jackson sets the terms for the help it will receive.
And in the rest of the state you have so much animosity toward Jackson that significant state investment is a non-starter.
The young folks want a vibrant city. They don't want to move to Columbus, Hattiesburg, Tupelo, or Bude.
On number one, I'm saying we have to get radical. Yes, incentivizing is common, but we've got to get "LA selling Chavez Ravine to O'Malley for $1" radical. We have tons to offer that should be appealing - from river access to proximity to major distribution centers and the coast.
As far as number two goes, it's all about scale. This isn't going to happen overnight. Bring in something that's going to employ the blue collar workforce in a region and get some extra coin in their pocket. That will bring more business into the area to meet the increasing demand. Ultimately the median income grows. "A rising tide lifts all boats."
On number three, MS isn't for everyone. We've got to clean up our urban centers to make them more attractive for young folks to work and live, and enjoy the nightlife. I think eliminating the sales tax will help keep more people in the state. Our politics suck in this state on both sides of the aisle. How we spend on education and how each county's school districts are laid out is stupid. Access to healthcare is a concern. Towns in the delta are a mess.
None of this is easy. In fact, most of it is impossible the way things are currently. I'm just really spitballing about what I think would get us out of this 75 year rut. There was once a time that Vicksburg was one of the major population centers of the south along with Memphis. There's a lot of potential in this state if we can just stop stepping on our dicks.
Rankin County can match Madison County easily for places to live, play and work. and it doesnt have a Canton, Vaughn or Flora School system to drag it down like Madison County does.
There's tons of stuff planned along 269 between Getwell and Byhalia. 25 years from now that whole thoroughfare is going to look completely different than it does now.
How are you gonna replace the revenue lost by eliminating the income tax? Increase sales or property taxes? Other states around us with income taxes seem to be doing ok.
Rankin County is a great place to live. Its per capita income is second only to Madison. It has solid public schools and very little crime. Brandon the city has a ton of momentum.
There is that sheriff issue though.
MS has great places to retire. I'll be a member of the that group in a few years. Not sure if that's beneficial. The elderly are the wealthiest Americans, they are a protected class in civil rights law, they are the biggest recipients of federal welfare, they have seniority rights in employment and they vote. But, they typically don't embrace change or reforms that promote economic dynamism.
There’s a lot in the works for McIngvale too around the new high school. Heck I’d say 10-15 years it won’t be recognizable.
Rankin's issues are a sheriff's department likely to see a federal investigation in 2024 and losing the M Braves when the city of Pearl owes close to $3 million on Trustmark Park.
I hope not.....because it will be the same cycle as Whitehaven, Parkway village and Hickory Hill......and now the Collierville mall.
There was hope Memphis would rebuild areas of town and stop some of the urban sprawl of Generica before the great awaken of 2020......but not now...with the Dems, "Defund the police" and the soft policy on crime. So.....back to everyone running out of Shelby COunty to repeat whats in Shelby County.
Not the brain drain or the drain on the work force. That started in the 20s really, but accelerated during after WW!!.
Well, like it or not, it's coming. The key difference is that a lot of those soft crime policies don't exist down here (yet).
Shelby County’s biggest issue is they neutered the local law enforcement during the COVID epidemic when everyone lost all common sense.
The key to changing Jackson is the LOCAL government. Municipal government has to be the one to change things in ANY municipality.
There have been other discussions about in-state vs out of state students. I would guess that not many out of state students stay in MS after graduating.
So, while it may be better for the universities to bring in out of state students to grow attendance numbers, it probably doesn't help the overall economy any.
First of all, the revenue from the state tax is relatively insignificant because of the poverty levels in the state. Secondly, MS state tax is higher than virtually all states around us.
Secondly, between property tax and ad valorem tax, we are already overtaxed in this state.
The answer is being smarter with what the state is doing with the tax revenue they already collect.
I think its pretty 17ing dumb to claim things will get worse at a faster rate 20 years from now as justification for keeping things how they are and how they have been this century. Perhaps that sort of reasoning is, in part, why MS is where it is right now.
I know this wont be popular with many on here, but maybe pulling people in that are naturalized citizens or not yet citizens would help the state.
97.6% of people in Mississippi were born in the US. Thats compared to 84.2% for the country as a whole. Below is a chart comparing Mississippi with some southern states that are seen as growing as well as a few traditionally strong states when it comes to population/economy.
Tennessee is 5% less than MS and then the next closest is 10% less.
Make the state attractive to 1st gen immigrants. Encourage it. That wont magically fix everything, but its a start and can help.
Next up- the state needs to give a 17 about its people.
- At the local level, prosecute crime that hurts people and hurts community. I am the last person to want more jails and prisons, but if that is what is needed to reduce crime, reduce harm, and improve communities- do it.
- At the state level, vote for things that help the state. Accept money from the government for healthcare, dont refuse it because that is stupid. Dont reduce women's reproductive health access and claim its in an effort to improve safety. This is especially true in a rural state where healthcare is already tough to access for some, and even more difficult since reproductive health is a common offering that rural hospitals and clinics drop first(I am talking about reproductive healthcare, like what everyone's mom, wife, and daughter needs easy access to).
- At the state level, improve access to early childhood education.
I have seen multiple posts claiming taxes for corporate land need to be reduced/eliminated and income tax needs to be reduced. I mean, ok try that, I guess. The state already has very low education ranking, very high poverty, very low federal tax paid per capita, and is one of the highest recipients in federal aid per capita.
Eliminating income tax and slash property taxes to bring in business seems like a plan to keep digging your way out of a hole, but in a state where people think there are only 2 options and prefer a slow decline, I can see digging your way out of the problem as being seen as a good plan.
I think the income tax provides about 1/3 of state revenue.
Coast, like Tupelo, is punching well above its weight already. Both are great places to live, and both will survive in some way. They are not the problems towns in MS, along with the college towns and Memphis Metro.
Again I ask you though, what can the state actually do? Then @57stratdawg says elections have consequences, and he's obviously talking about the state Republicans. What can they possibly do?
The only thing I can really think of is consolidation of recruiting efforts (through MDA I guess), instead of everybody looking out for their own little small town.
I go back to the Braveheart conversation. This state, from top to bottom, has no sense of itself. It's towns war with each other. It's noble share allegiance with (insert Tennessee, Louisiana, Alabama, Florida, wherever folks go to spend their free money and brag on facebook). You make enemies on both sides, you'll end up dead.
It's true.
Right. Now how is the state spending that revenue, and in what ways can we generate alternate revenue for the state (if needed after shoring up spending)?
It's not going to be solved overnight, primarily because the conditions were not created overnight. Mississippi has been careening toward this since at least the 1960s if not since the 1870s. Mississippi is an adopted place for me, and I love a lot of things about it. But, reading stuff like this makes me damn glad I live in Georgia. Setting politics aside, Georgia has always worked toward progress and typically in a conservative fashion (even when the Dems were in charge pre-2000). They focused on infrastructure, they didn't abandon Atlanta when it was at it's worst in the 1980s and they have directed resources toward other areas of the state to lift them as well - almost without hesitation. So while the secondary cities like Savannah, Macon, Columbus & August all floundered a bit in the 1980s and 1990s as their respective industries left, they are all now seeing major growth. And they have focused the past 20 years at least on jobs and what it takes to attract them. My city now has the busiest roll-on/roll-off port on the East Coast and are close to the busiest in the country; Savannah has the busiest container port on the east coast; Hyundai is about to bring 15,000 more jobs to Coastal GA with a new EV plant opening in '25; the film industry touches every corner of the state (an industry that almost didn't exist here 20 years ago). Georgia didn't give up when the textile industry left north Georgia in the 80s - they shifted to carpets and flooring. When the fishing industry collapsed on the coast we focused on building the ports. When Ford and GM shut down around Atlanta, we got Hyundai in Columbus and now on the coast, plus some VW spill over from Chattanooga - while making sure the former plants got redeveloped in a responsible manner. We have a highly diversified tax revenue stream and a highly pro-business development approach to State and Local tax incentives and that is jobs focused. The biggest thing is we didn't sit around and do nothing for a half century.
The state has a surplus now... Meaning they in effect collected too much tax. So Tate (and others) want to eliminate the income tax so that MS can compete with other surrounding states that don't have one (Texas and I think Tennessee?) for job-producing projects.
So the idea is:
1. Reduce or Eliminate the income tax (we have had a surplus recently anyway, so it should be a no-brainer)
2. Recruit and heavily incentivize new industrial and tech companies here (made easier by cost of living and theoretically no income tax) to create good-paying jobs. These companies will create ad valorem and maybe sales tax revenue for the state too, which is huge. Golden Triangle, Madison County, the Hattiesburg ADP, and others are already being successful at this - learn what they do and do more of it.
3. Train the current working-age citizenry in trades for the incoming jobs (like Amazon, Nissan, etc. have done) to bring up our workforce. This not only gives more income to Mississippians, but gives the state a good base to show other new companies they can build and hire good people in this state. The state is trying to do this with the Accelerate Mississippi program. (https://acceleratems.org/)
4. Build new schools AND improve the ones we have. High quality education is absolutely essential if we ever want new people to move to the state.
5. Keep building new retail/entertainment/sports/quality of life type amenities so that people enjoy life here and want to stay, and so that people from other states want to move here.
6. The more all this happens, and the more there is light somewhere at the end of a very long tunnel, the less brain drain we will have, which is great. The more success we'll have in moving new people in. And the more opportunities we will have for those young adults to feel it's okay to "move back home" after they spent their 20's living it up in NYC or Nashville. We need all those things to happen.
It's a long long long term plan, but it can work.
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Vicksburg has plans for a new port just south of I-20. I think they have acquired the land and now just need to put together the plans to actually build the port on the Mississippi and infrastructure to access it. It will be interesting to see if they can get industry to re/locate there. Another thing is how much business can it attract and how many jobs does it actually create?
It's a damn shame the sheriffs' issues didn't come to light a little sooner before the election than they did. I'm sure he would haven't run for reelection unopposed. There were over 5,000 write in votes against him this last election. A lot of the issues have been known or at the very least rumored with him. I'm sure more will come out once these lawsuits start gaining some steam.
I have heard that a lot of the warehousing industry that's now in Desoto County was the same warehousing that used to be in Memphis. So....if you're doing the same things in DC that you were doing in Memphis, it certainly stands to reason that what you got in Memphis, you'll soon get in DC.
I believe it's 1/3 of the General Fund Revenue ($2.2B of the $6.3B general fund).
It's like 7-8% of the overall budget revenue.
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