Very interesting article in the Atlantic, which describes a newsletter by Michael Podhorzer. Sadly the original does not seem to be on line.
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/ar ... er/661377/
I've modified the Atlantic text in a couple of places to improve my own understanding.
PODHORZER DEFINES MODERN red and blue America as the states in which each party has usually held unified control of the governorship and state legislature in recent years
There are 25 red states, 17 blue states, and 11 purple states, where state-government control has typically been divided.
[blue states] contribute 48 percent and the red …35 percent [of GDP]
The gross domestic product per person and the median household income are now both more than 25 percent greater in the blue section than in the red, according to Podhorzer’s calculations. The share of kids in poverty is more than 20 percent lower in the blue section than red, and the share of working households with incomes below the poverty line is nearly 40 percent lower. Health outcomes are diverging too. Gun deaths are almost twice as high per capita in the red places as in the blue, as is the maternal mortality rate. The COVID vaccination rate is about 20 percent higher in the blue section, and the per capita COVID death rate is about 20 percent higher in the red. Life expectancy is nearly three years greater in the blue (80.1 years) than the red (77.4) states. (On most of these measures, the purple states, fittingly, fall somewhere in between.)
Per capita spending on elementary and secondary education is almost 50 percent higher in the blue states compared with red. All of the blue states have expanded access to Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act, while about 60 percent of the total red-nation population lives in states that have refused to do so. All of the blue states have set a minimum wage higher than the federal level of $7.25, while only about one-third of the red-state residents live in places that have done so. [Blue states] have a much higher share of unionized workers than the [red states]. No state in the blue section has a law on the books banning abortion before fetal viability, while almost all of the red states are poised to restrict abortion rights if the Republican-appointed Supreme Court majority, as expected, overturns Roe v. Wade. Almost all of the red states have also passed “stand your ground” laws backed by the National Rifle Association, which provide a legal defense for those who use weapons against a perceived threat, while none of the blue states have done so.
It points out that in the 20th C, red and blue states came closer together by these metrics. Now they are moving apart again . The 'again' refers to the fact that the 'red' and 'blue' states correspond well with slave owning and non-slave owning states at the founding of the US. These only managed to come together by an uneasy compromise. At first, they converged, and were most focused on internal matters. Then the red states started attempting to impose their views on the blue states, leading to the Civil War.
The flurry of socially conservative laws that red states have passed since 2021, on issues such as abortion; classroom discussions of race, gender, and sexual orientation; and LGBTQ rights, is widening this split. No Democratic-controlled state has passed any of those measures.
… the growing separation means that after the period of fading distinctions, bedrock differences dating back to the country’s founding are resurfacing. And one crucial element of that …is the return of … “one-party rule” in the red nation.
