Texas Vs.California: The Standard of Living Difference

The National Review reports:

The people moving from California to Texas have significantly higher incomes than those making the opposite trek: about $56,000 per tax return for the Texas-bound vs. about $50,000 per tax return for the California-bound. And that doesn’t even take into account the radically different cost of living in the two places: The median home in Texas sells for $128,000 vs. $383,900 in California, $124,700 in Houston vs. $470,000 in Los Angeles. The median California home costs 6.25 times the median California household income, while the median Texas home costs 2.48 times the median Texas household income. Those people moving to Texas are getting a big raise in real terms; the ones moving to California are taking a pay cut. For young people, the lifetime returns to Texas’s lower cost of living can be substantial: Even an extra $2,500 a year in savings throughout your twenties means a couple of hundred thousand more in your retirement account at 65.

California politicians sure are greedy.