Joel Kotkin on the exodus from California

When I talk to my class, 36 kids, and I ask them, "How many of you are going to stay in California?" Four. That never would've happened twenty years ago. Why would anyone want to leave California? With great weather, beautiful topography, all sorts of culture, great food, all the stuff that is really unique to California. It takes policy genius of some diabolical sort to push people out of California.

~ Joel Kotkin, "The Reasons Why So Many People Are Leaving California," 25:15 mark, The Epoch Times, February 19, 2020

Joel Kotkin: "Most California politicians are economically illiterate"

Basically, most California politicians are economically illiterate. The vast majority of the Democrats in particular in the California legislature have no business experience. Now, in Texas, Democrats and Republicans both have business experience. So they don't even understand how it [the economy] works.

~ Joel Kotkin, "The Reason Why So Many People Are Leaving California," 11:50 mark, The Epoch Times, February 19, 2020

Nerdrotic on the mass exodus from San Francisco

I don't want to live in a city where rioting and looting is allowed.   I know, that sounds crazy.  I'm the bad guy here.  But I don't want to live in a place where it's against the law for my wife to go and run her business, but it's perfectly ok if someone wakes up in the morning and burns down my wife's business.

~ Nerdrotic, " San Francisco's Mass Exodus," YouTube, 2:08 mark

Michael Snyder on the mass exodus of businesses from cities as a result of the riots and looting

Urban communities all over the U.S. are now facing the possibility of a mass exodus of businesses, and many local leaders are freaking out because they realize what such a mass exodus will mean for their cities. In the aftermath of George Floyd’s death, peaceful protests were held in more than 300 cities all across America, and a recent CNN poll found that 84 percent of all Americans supported those peaceful protests. Unfortunately, rioting, looting and violence also erupted in major cities from coast to coast, and very little was done to suppress that violence. As a result, the core areas of many of our largest cities now resemble war zones, and in the months ahead there will be a constant threat that the violence could flare up again at any time.

~ Michael Snyder, publisher of The Economic Collapse Blog, "As Businesses Flee the Violence, Will Major U.S. Cities Be Transformed Into Economic Wastelands?," June 10, 2020

Peter Atwater on residents of Hong Kong leaving for Taiwan

Few behaviors express sentiment like voluntary emigration.  We finally flee when we see hopelessness.

~ Peter Atwater, August 20, 2019 tweet