Editor’s note: Jon Margolis is VTDigger’s political columnist.
Sorry, Gov. It looks like it’s the weather after all.
In his budget message Tuesday, Gov. Phil Scott made much of two facts: That “approximately 26,000 native-born Vermonters live in Florida,” and “27,000 native-born Vermonters now live in New Hampshire.”
To Scott, that second fact proved that the reason Vermonters relocate to Florida is “not just the weather.”
And though he didn’t say it in so many words, in the context of his talk it was clear that he knew just what else it was. The context was taxes. His message was clear: Vermonters pack up their belongings and move to Florida and New Hampshire because neither has a state income tax.
He should be ashamed of himself.
Let’s keep things in perspective here. The paragraph in which Scott stated his demographic data was 26 words long, or roughly one half of 1 percent of his budget speech. The speech itself was … well, it was fine. The wisdom of its policy proposals could be debated, but that’s true every time any governor makes a speech. He painted his administration as a bit more innovative than it is. But – again – what else is new? By and large, his budget message was coherent, moderate, rational, worth taking seriously.
So what we’re talking about here is a very little bit of sleaze. Still, a little bit of sleaze is … a little bit of sleaze, which is unbecoming in a governor. If anything, it is more unbecoming in a governor who has not in any way been a sleazy fellow.
So it’s tempting to blame someone on his staff, and to be charitable, perhaps the staff person was (or staff persons were) more careless than sleazy.
Not much of an excuse. When you’re on the governor’s staff, your responsibility is not to be so careless that you commit – and make your boss seem to commit – even a little bit of sleaze.
Just what is the sleaze here?
It is using statistics out of context to make a point that the statistics do not make. In this case, the statistics come closer to refuting the point, though they don’t definitively do that, either.
One of the things both Scott and his staff should have known is that one always flirts with intellectual dishonesty – or sleaze – when using one or two pieces of data out of context.
That’s true even when the data are completely accurate, as were the ones Scott used in his speech. They come right from the United States government, specifically the Census Bureau’s 2016 American Community Survey. They show that – sure enough! – 24,951 people (so Scott exaggerated just a tad) who were born in Vermont now live in Florida, presumably enjoying both the sunshine and the absence of a state income tax.
And, as the governor said, 26,457 people who’d been born in Vermont (close enough to 27,000 for government work) now live in New Hampshire, perhaps enjoying the absence of a state income tax though probably not noticing much difference in the weather.
Two data points which, taken together but isolated from all others, would seem to support Scott’s oft-stated assertion that high taxes are driving Vermonters away to states like Florida and New Hampshire.
Not isolated from all others they tell quite a different story. That’s because 38,757 people who were born New Hampshire now live in Vermont (or did in 2016. Obviously all these figures are estimates. The methodology is available on the Census Bureau’s website).
That’s right. Over the years, more people born in New Hampshire have moved to Vermont than vice versa. To be sure, for the last century or so, more people have been born in New Hampshire to begin with, so proportionately, the moving back and forth is about even.
Not so with Vermonters and New Hampshirers (Hampshireites) moving to Florida. Remember, there were just shy of 25,000 native Vermonters living in Florida in 2016.
And 57,749 who had been born in New Hampshire. That’s more than twice as many. And while New Hampshire’s population is now slightly more than twice Vermont’s, that’s a recent development. Over the decades, a person born in New Hampshire was more likely to move to Florida than was a person born in Vermont.
Not to save on taxes. Both states are among the lowest-taxed in the country, but New Hampshire’s taxes are lower. It doesn’t have a general sales tax. Florida does. At every income level, according to a widely accepted study done by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, Floridians pay a greater percentage of their income in state and local taxes than they would if they lived in New Hampshire.
New Hampshire is a much richer state than Florida, with at least comparable job opportunities. So it’s not likely that all those folks moved down there to make more money.
Odds are, they did it for the weather.
Just like most of those 24,951 native Vermonters.
Besides, if you give this whole topic a moment’s thought (which Scott and his aides seem not to have done; didn’t they think anyone would check their numbers?), it’s clear that the “native-born” movers are hardly representative. Those Census figures show that most Vermonters and most New Hampshire residents were born elsewhere. Over the decades, tens of thousands of people born in other states have moved into the two states (often as children) and then moved out. They’re not part of the data Scott cited.
The governor is right to be concerned about Vermont’s stagnant population. He may be right to insist on not raising any taxes. That’s no excuse for him using statistics to mislead.
