quest
pop quiz here you see the people here on
the photos these are all famous names I
just want you know anybody can shout it
out what do all these people have in
common they’re all Mississippians right
we’re here in Mississippi every single
promotional thing that our state puts
out all the commercials will we’ll talk
about all the famous people that have
come from Mississippi and it’s true that
we probably produce more people and
especially creative people who have
whose names even whose first names like
Oprah and Elvis are known worldwide I
mean that’s a tremendous you know it
shows the the potency of Mississippi and
so you guys are all right yeah the
answer is that they’re all born in
Mississippi but there’s a second part of
that answer and if you had seen the
topic of my talk it might have given you
a hint about it the second part is that
none of them became famous while they
were living in Mississippi
so all these Mississippi natives had to
go somewhere else to become famous now
these are just the most famous most
prominent examples of what is actually a
pervasive problem and that is the fact
that for generations
Mississippi’s young people have left
more have left than have come to
Mississippi many have been pulled out by
opportunity that could be found
elsewhere that couldn’t be found in the
state others have been pushed out
because of oppression because of lack of
opportunity here Latka lack of
advancement here it’s a problem that
still exists and still it’s it’s getting
worse and worse in it and I feel like
the reason I want to highlight it in
this forum particularly is that we all
know it many of us individually know it
especially those who go to college in
the state you make the decision do you
stay or do you go it’s not something
know that we talked about a lot in in
public policy debates and our politics
and yet it is the issue that sort of
undergirds every other issue in the
state of Mississippi so let me explain
that first I’m going to sort of put put
a few numbers on this problem just so we
can get
a sense of how big and how vast it is
just in one year 2015-2016 Mississippi
lost about 7500 more people than moved
in so this just just over 12 months
7,500 people population of the state of
Mississippi is is just shy of 3 million
if you if you sort of add a few more
years to that go back a few more years
and look since 2010 you’ll see that that
7500 number is not just a one-year
phenomenon it’s happening it’s recurring
so Mississippi has a persistent out
migration problem and so just from 2010
you know just just from from the time
that you know we had the I don’t know
the iPhone 3 to now Mississippi has lost
35,000 more people than its gained we
also have some stats about lifetime
so this problem didn’t start in 2015 it
didn’t start in 2010 it’s been going on
for for almost 80 years now and so we
can we can actually look through census
data and see how many people who are
living in the United States of America
today were actually born in the state of
Mississippi and then we can subtract out
how many people today still live in the
state of Mississippi and you’ll find
that that we’ve lost about 400,000
people four hundred thousand more people
were born in the state of Mississippi
than currently live in the state of
Mississippi you know these are big
numbers I think it’s helpful if we
actually sort of put it in perspective
but thinking about it as a city just
taking that number that 35,000 number
since 2010 you know if that were a
contiguous City where would it stack up
in terms of rankings in Mississippi
Mississippi is a small state it’s a
rural state we don’t have a lot of big
cities you’re sitting in the only city
that that’s over a hundred thousand so
if you take just the people that have
left between 2010 2016 put them all
together that would be the ninth largest
city in the state of Mississippi go
if you take the people that are living
elsewhere over a lifetime well that
that’s over double the population of the
city of Jackson in fact that 400,000
number that 396,000 number is actually
bigger than the the five largest cities
and Mississippi combined and so we’re
basically talking about you know a city
a massive city of Mississippians that
are just living elsewhere so the biggest
city in Mississippi is not Jackson it’s
actually the Mississippians that are
living in Texas or living in Georgia I
think it’s really useful if we think
about it in those terms now what makes
this not just a problem but actually I
think a crisis is that no other state
even nearby that touches Mississippi is
experiencing the same problem every
single one of those states in fact every
other state in the entire southeastern
United States is importing people
Mississippi is at the crossroads of the
fastest-growing most attractive place to
live in America right now and yet we’re
the exception
we are the outlier so that in the same
period that we lost 35,000 people you’ll
see that Tennessee grew by by nearly a
hundred fifty thousand but even states
Tennessee’s sort of in third year
Alabama and Louisiana Arkansas these
states are in first year they’re in sort
of load deer but they’re still adding
people year after year at the same time
that that Mississippi is losing it so so
they may not be accelerating very fast
but we’re in Reverse I think we need to
you know not just think about ourselves
as being kind of part of the mid-south
now not everybody you know moves out in
equal proportions like this is this is
particularly acute among young people
and and so why I think it’s pertinent to
talk about this on a college campus so
when we ask the question like who we’re
leaving who were among that thirty five
thousand what we know is that ninety
percent are under the age of thirty five
ninety percent of the pea
people that have left and again this is
this is subtracting out the people that
have moved in so we we are we are
talking about just a deficit that we are
running and giving to to the rest of the
country we’re giving our young people
this this map here if some of you may
have seen it it sort of went around
virally in the state a few months ago
but if you look at the Millennial
population and Millennials you know
everybody that’s kind of a an ambiguous
term yet but but they look at
Millennials talk about them as people
born between 1980 and 2000 and if you
looked at the Millennial population in
every state in the United States none
has lost more since 2010 than
Mississippi in fact none even comes
close the next closest we lost nearly
four percent four out of 100 Millennials
in just six years and those are people
that are not being replaced people who
are moving out and not being replaced
the next closest was New Mexico which
was about 2.8 percent and then it was
Illinois that was about 2.3 percent and
beyond that you can’t actually find that
many states that lost more Millennials
than then they attracted the United
States as a whole is importing a lot of
people from other countries a lot of
young people from other countries
Mississippi is is not just the outlier
in the region but in many ways we’re an
outlier nationally the second thing we
know about this population that’s
leaving is that they’re the people who
get education in the state of
Mississippi so Mississippi you know is
we’re 50th and so many different
education metrics it consumes so much of
our our work in the state people who
want to advance the state you know we
say what’s the what’s the number one
thing we need to do we need to educate
our young people when we do that
successfully the problem is often the
road to opportunity is the road out of
the state of Mississippi and so for the
kids that we’re succeeding and we are
failing many many kids in the state but
when we succeed often what
doing is just increasing the chances
that they’re going to take that
education and move to another state and
so what this graph shows is that if you
look at it people who have not gotten a
college degree who have either some
college or an associate’s degree all the
way down to people who didn’t complete
high school Mississippi is actually
importing more than we are sending out
of the state so when we’re talking about
the these big numbers you know people
who were who were going we’re talking
about people who get bachelor’s degrees
and graduate degrees in the state of
Mississippi and you’ll see that the more
education the more degrees you get in
Mississippi the higher the chances
you’ll leave and many of these people
that leave they’re taking their families
with them and so that’s what that’s what
creates such a big a big hole 35,000 and
that’s that’s something that’s going to
be passed down generation to generation
now where are they going
Mississippi has been exporting people
really an Ernest since since the 40s the
great migration we saw migration of of
black agricultural laborers from rural
Mississippi and really all of the rural
South moving to the industrial Midwest
Chicago Milwaukee Detroit and so that’s
what this this graph shows this came
from the New York Times they looked at
census data going back a century and
you’ll see how what percentage of
Mississippians stayed in the state and
it’s actually been relatively flat it
maybe even we we retain a few more now
than we did 50 years ago but you can
really see that where people are going
has has changed especially if you get to
spend a little time with with this data
Illinois Michigan the Midwest that was
the prime destination for for the
majority of the latter half of the 20th
century but now where people are going
Tennessee Texas Florida Georgia it’s the
south so people aren’t deciding between
whether to stay in Mississippi or move a
thousand miles away they’re choosing
whether to stay in Mississippi were or
move to a city within Drive
distance of Mississippi and that’s
that’s a much a much bigger and much
different question I think when we’re
talking about solutions
now refined that and follow-up on that
point that we know that they’re not just
moving to rural Georgia rural Texas we
know that they’re moving to Atlanta to
Houston to Dallas with what this map
shows is a county-by-county migration
numbers between 2000 and 2010 so the
purple counties and especially the deep
purple counties are the ones that are
attracting a huge influx of people and
the orange counties are the ones that
are that are sending them away you’ll
see and you can overlay this with a map
of southern geography but you’ll see
that that really it’s not spread evenly
across the south you know these states
that are attracting hundreds of
thousands of people it’s being
concentrated in metropolitan areas and
even in Mississippi you’ll see that that
the places that are growing are the more
metropolitan now let’s let’s sort of cap
this with actually some real numbers
about you know just how many people from
Mississippi are living in these other
states and where they’re going so said
Texas is number one by far we’ve said
seventy-five thousand more people in
Texas than Texas is sent to us you’ll
see that Florida Georgia are up there
the only in fact the only two states
that we’ve imported more people from
than we’ve sent over a lifetime are
Louisiana and Tennessee now part of that
especially in Tennessee is DeSoto County
we see a lot of suburbanization for
Memphis but I want to I want to put a
little asterisk on that data because
I’ll just confess I consider myself a
lifelong Mississippian I love
Mississippi I want Mississippi to be my
home forever but in this data I actually
count as a Tennessean because I’m from
Oxford but my parents decided to deliver
me at Baptist East Memorial Hospital in
Memphis and so according to the US
Census I was born in Tennessee and
therefore six hours after birth i i’m i
grated to mississippi and so and i think
probably many of you too where do people
in mississippi
South Mississippi go-to to give birth if
they’re not coming to Jackson its New
Orleans we’re importing people from
Louisiana and this in these figures
North Mississippi it’s Memphis we’re
importing people from Tennessee so just
to put a little asterisk on that on that
data shell of all heard the expression
thank God for Mississippi right you know
it means that you know if it weren’t for
Mississippi then then maybe we’d be last
so other states really should be
thanking us they should be earnestly
thanking us because when we’re sending
people especially young people who have
gotten a college degree in Mississippi
there they are contributing tax dollars
they are contributing their ideas talent
they’re starting businesses there and so
this is this is a chart of just how much
money you know how much how much of a
check are we cutting to to all of the
other southeastern states every year now
this this comes from the IRS you can
actually look and see who filed taxes in
one state in one year and filed another
state in another year and so I went and
compiled that data and looked in the
year 2015 at all the people that had
moved out of the states between 2010 and
2015 and how much they earned in those
new states and subtracted out how much
people who lived at Mississippi earned
in Mississippi and what you find is that
people who left Mississippi earned one
point four billion dollars this is one
year one point four billion dollars more
outside the state of Mississippi than
people who moved here earned in state of
Mississippi our entire state GDP is just
over a hundred billion and it and it’s
not growing very fast
we’re doing a lot of work for we’re
putting in a lot of effort into
recruiting businesses here we’re trying
to fill up a bucket while we’re not
actually plugging this massive hole this
1.4 billion dollar-a-year
hole and it’s it’s not going you know
necessarily to California in New York
it’s it’s going to our neighbors like
they really should be thanking us Texas
got a 500 million dollar subsidy
because of Mississippians moving there
in 2015
Tennessee Georgia all these all these
states are making hundreds of millions
even Alabama got a hundred and fifty
million dollars more from Mississippians
than we got from from them so thank God
for Mississippi you know we really
should make them make them pay us back
for this now you know these are big
numbers I sort of talked about this in
aggregate what I actually think is most
potent about this issue is that we all
have four personal stories and that that
every person’s decision about where
they’re going to live like that’s one of
the most sort of intimate private
choices that we can make and so talking
about it in these big sweeping terms is
good for for policy but but really I
think we need to break it down to one
number and that’s that’s the $9,000
$9,000 question is how I frame it so
what $9,000 represents is the average
earnings that somebody in Mississippi
who has a college degree will make in
the state of Mississippi less than what
the average person who has college
degree will make nationally so people in
Mississippi if you have a college degree
and you stay in Mississippi on average
you’re taking about a $9,000 hit that’s
it that’s that’s a huge sacrifice that’s
about 20% of the average income now of
course it varies person to person but
what we need to ask ourselves I think
one is how can we close that gap we need
we need to sort of demand of
policymakers we need to demand of
business leaders that that
Mississippians need to be earning on par
at least with the rest of the southeast
and so $9,000 is our is our deficit
compared to two Nash in the national
average it’s $7,500 less though than the
southeast so Mississippi you were paying
a premium to be here a lot of people
cannot escape that mathematics that sort
of financial arithmetic even if they
want to stay in the
specific we got it we gotta make it
financially viable for them but the
second question is what are the
qualitative things what is the quality
of life what is it that’s worth to you
in your life that that will offset that
$9,000 that you might give up you know
what meaning what fulfillment can we
offer people in Mississippi that that
will make up for the earnings hit that
they might take and I think that there
there are a lot of different answers for
that I think that this this forum is a
good example of that I certainly know in
my life that what I do I could never do
in another state that I actually get
I’ve advanced my career by being in
Mississippi because I have the the
freedom to do things that when you have
something talked about a lot is that you
can wear a lot of hats in Mississippi
you know you don’t get put in a box in
Mississippi if you if you care people
care about families people care about
relationships here people care about
creativity there are a lot of things but
I think as a state we get kind of tied
up in this conversation about you know
material deficits you know how can we if
we give if we give just enough tax
incentives maybe we can bring keep
people here I want to ask and leave you
with this $9,000 question is what are
the qualitative things that might make
that that $9,000 hurt a little bit
little less to people what is it what is
it that that we can do to make
Mississippi a place where people can can
live and be fulfilled and make more
benefit you know a lot of it is I think
the impact that you can have on those
around you and in your community these
are the things that that we need to talk
about on a personal level on an
educational level on a business level
and certainly on a political level thank you