Here's another puzzler: Florida's budget is half that of its less-populous northern friend, New York, yet people are leaving NY and moving south

August, 2022: Governor Hochul to new york republicans: “Just jump on a bus and head down to Florida where you belong. Get out of town!”

Over at Powerline, John Hinderaker thinks he may have stumbled upon the answer

“As states increasingly segregate into red and blue, California, New York, Texas and Florida are the heavyweight contenders. (Although, don’t forget poor Illinois.) A year ago I had the good fortune to hear Governor Ron DeSantis give a speech to a Minnesota group in Naples, Florida. DeSantis said something that I thought couldn’t possibly be correct: that Florida has more people than New York, with a state budget only half as large. Afterward, I looked it up, and it was true. No wonder DeSantis romped to an overwhelming re-election!

“Yesterday the Wall Street Journal editorial board compared “New York vs. Florida, by the Numbers.” The comparison tells us pretty much everything we need to know about the relative merit of conservative and left-wing governance:

Take a look at the nearby chart comparing some key indicators of governance in a pair of states that not long ago were about the same size—New York and Florida. As recently as 2013 the two states had similar populations, but so many people have moved to the Sunshine State that it’s now roughly 2.6 million people larger.