alt Hacker NewsIt's interesting how Texas and Florida are both "red" states but have pivoted into really different political paths under the same flag.
Texas is leaning into becoming the manufacturing and R&D hub for the US, and is courting gigascale data centers and rolling out nuclear power, near-infinite solar, wind, and gas to power it as fast as possible.
Florida is leaning into the retired and populist factions of the GOP, banning data centers and taking on populist anti-tech positions that Texas wouldn't dare (because they want the investment).
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Texas is becoming a hub for educated professionals and Florida is a hub for non-college retirees
This isn’t really true. FL population has exploded so much with high earners that they’re talking about getting rid of property taxes, and Miami is like #2 behind Houston in terms of tech jobs growth.
i live in FL and i think the banning data centers thing is also just political posturing - we are in hurricane alley after all. i really don't think anyone was seriously considering building an AI data center in like St. John's County or whatever
If anything Florida (Desantis in particular) more closely resembles traditional conservatism in the US, as opposed to MAGA populism. I think, or hope, that's a good thing in the long run as AI shapes up to be a horseshoe political issue.
Is populism when politicians claim to care about little people issues instead of making economy arrow go up?
As a lifelong citizen of Texas, I would emphasize the decades-long renewable energy expansion has been happening _despite_ our political leadership, not because of it.