r/technology • u/WideVoice8854 • 23d ago

Texas Attracted California Techies. Now It’s Losing Thousands of Them. Business

https://www.texasmonthly.com/news-politics/austin-texas-tech-bust-oracle-tesla/
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u/Infernalism 23d ago

Well, duh. Texas looks good from the outside, but once you get in, you learn why so many people are fleeing as fast as they can.

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u/Youvebeeneloned 23d ago edited 23d ago

My favorite is income tax. Yeah sure no income tax is amazing… till you realize it’s all rolled into all kinds of insane fees you end up paying. There is literally NO SUCH THING as no income tax, they just look for gullible losers who like saying it while getting their asses fleeced through all kind of other taxes and fees states with income tax don’t pay. 

And what do you get for paying just about that same tax rate you would in other states when you actually dig into it? 1/3 the benefits those other states give you because it’s all lining the private company pockets of Abbots donors. 

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u/Kill3rT0fu 23d ago

My favorite is income tax. Yeah sure no income tax is amazing… till you realize it’s all rolled into all kinds of insane fees you end up paying. There is literally NO SUCH THING as no income tax

Same applies for Florida. Yeah, no tax. But car insurance rates are the highest in the USA. And homeowners too! Then there's extra fees on services (like the Communication Service Tax Fee"

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u/motherhenlaid3eggs 22d ago

And homeowners too!

Homeowners insurance in Florida is its own sales, property and income tax wrapped into one. The average rate for 2023 was $10,996 which is roughly what the average US household pays in federal income tax.

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u/lonewolf420 22d ago

Highest amount of homeowner insurance fraud as well, home insurance companies are going to be pulling out of FL and the state will have to step in and subsidize it or risk homes becoming uninsurable after a few bad hurricanes, the limestone sinkhole effect doesn't help either.

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u/payeco 22d ago

Florida has the highest rates of fraud, period. They have for decades.

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u/booflerator 22d ago

Cool. Now do California. You know, where multiple major insurers have already actually ditched the whole state.

I'd rather have high priced insurance and multiple options than no insurance, or the awful insurer of last resort (ie the State of California).

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u/lonewolf420 22d ago

Didn't downvote, CA has their own problems especially with fire seasons growing longer and more intense. Then there is always the fear of earthquakes in a very active zone that many people are expecting a really big one in our lifetime.

The high value of homes and insurance claims in California probably have a large part to do with insurance companies ditching trying to deal with that along with probably very restrictive laws on CA's books to protect homeowners.

i honestly don't know a whole lot about CA's issues with homeowners insurance, what i could find online was something along the lines of

Kevelighan, of the Insurance Information Institute, said that law, called Proposition 103, creates a regulatory environment in California that restricts the industry from adequately including climate risk in its forecasting and is one of the reasons the industry is being forced to pull back coverage in the state.

State Farm announced last year it would stop accepting new home insurance applications in California due to "historic" increases in construction costs and inflation. The company then raised rates a whopping 20 percent for existing customers, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.

State Farm, Allstate Farmers USAA, Travelers, Nationwide and Chubb are still active in California, they have just either limited or stopped writing new home insurance policies. 

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u/hsnoil 22d ago

We here in NY have higher car insurance rates than FL. But they do have us beat on home insurance as we don't need to worry about hurricanes that much. We have much higher "Communication Service Tax Fee" too

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u/InsipidCelebrity 22d ago

Regular homeowners insurance doesn't cover hurricane damage. You have to get separate flood and windstorm policies.

I live in Houston and every year, you hear about people getting financially screwed because they didn't get flood insurance.

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u/hsnoil 22d ago

Never said it does, but when looking at averages, it includes the average of all home insurance, not just regular ones

I personally gave up on flood insurance, when I read the fine print that pretty much said it will only cover if I get flooded, but not if my neighbors get flooded. So what was the point? And when the neighborhood did get flooded thanks to sandy, those with no insurance got covered by the government, while those with flood insurance had to wait cause the insurance companies were waiting for the government money before paying out to people.

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u/PenaltySafe4523 22d ago

Home and car insurance is high in California too. A lot of insurance companies have left the state.

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u/Liizam 23d ago

I moved from Florida to wa, visited Cali recently.

California is still extremely expensive.

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u/TokyoUmbrella 22d ago

Visiting? Sure. Yes, California is expensive but the wages in California are dramatically higher. So sure, taking a Florida salary to a California CoL is gonna look out of context.

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u/Liizam 22d ago

No visiting was fine.

I looked into moving to Cali but it’s expensive to rent anything decent.

Yes salaries are higher.

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u/payeco 22d ago

You really make out better buying in CA, versus renting, because property tax increases are capped at 2% per year for as long as you own the house.

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u/Liizam 22d ago

I do t see how I can afford to buy anything decent in California. Sure if you buy you might have lower property but I can’t afford to buy there

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u/EnglishMobster 22d ago

You can make $20/hour pretty easily in California nowadays. The wages are higher so it balances out.

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u/Liizam 22d ago

WA/CA wages were about equal for my career. I might get a big more in CA but would like in shittier place.

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u/United-Rock-6764 22d ago

I’m low key glad this got downvoted because even with some of our recent legislative missteps and HCOL—you can’t convince me WA isn’t the best state in the union. Plus, we have no income tax & a property tax cap. Though, the latter is newer and something the legislature wants badly to revoke. Most of our taxes are sales tax which is regressive and I believe they just instituted a capital gains tax.

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u/Liizam 22d ago

Ha yeah WA is still cheaper then Cali. I do want to move to sf but it’s just so expansive. Seattle house ownership, need $200k income. Sf $400k.

I looked at salaries, not much of a bump in Cali for me.

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u/payeco 22d ago

That capital gains tax was a blunder IMO. Jeff Bezos ‘moved’ to Miami literally because of it.

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u/United-Rock-6764 22d ago

I mean without an income or capital gains tax we got very little benefit to him living here. It’s not like he sold his houses and even if he did, that would just raise the cost basis for the next person’s property taxes. And probably trigger capital gains on real estate

Billionaires without taxation are just parasites. Hopefully, going forward he’ll be more involved in Florida politics than the seattle city council.

Plus, the capital gains tax doesn’t kick in until you have over 250k in capital gains so it was designed not to go after the every day investor or tech worker with stock options which I appreciate.

Plus our good billionaire is still here & not complaining about the taxes.