Study confirms Altria, Philip Morris International, Danone, Nestlé, PepsiCo and Coca-Cola are worst offenders
Plastic pollution on a Welsh beach. Volunteers collected and surveyed plastic waste across 84 countries over five years. Photograph: Paul Quayle/Alamy
Fewer than 60 multinationals are responsible for more than half of the world’s plastic pollution, with six responsible for a quarter of that, based on the findings of a piece of research published on Wednesday.
The researchers concluded that for every percentage increase in plastic produced, there was an equivalent increase in plastic pollution in the environment.
“Production really is pollution,” says one of the study’s authors, Lisa Erdle, director of science at the non-profit The 5 Gyres Institute.
An international team of volunteers collected and surveyed more than 1,870,000 items of plastic waste across 84 countries over five years: the bulk of the rubbish collected was single-use packaging for food, beverage, and tobacco products.
Less than half of that plastic litter had discernible branding that could be traced back to the company that produced the packaging; the rest could not be accounted for or taken responsibility for.
“This shows very, very, very well the need for transparency and traceability,” says a study author, Patricia Villarrubia-Gómez, a plastic pollution researcher at the Stockholm Resilience Centre. “[We need] to know who is producing what, so they can take responsibility, right?”
The branded half of the plastic was the responsibility of just 56 fast-moving consumer goods multinational companies, and a quarter of that was from just six companies.
The two tobacco companies Altria and Philip Morris International combined made up 2% of the branded plastic litter found, both Danone and Nestlé each produced 3% of it, PepsiCo was responsible for 5% of the discarded packaging, and 11% of branded plastic waste could be traced to the Coca-Cola company.
“The industry likes to put the responsibility on the individual,” says the study’s author, Marcus Eriksen, a plastic pollution expert from The 5 Gyres Institute.
“But we’d like to point out that it’s the brands, it’s their choice for the kinds of packaging [they use] and for embracing this throwaway model of delivering their goods. That’s what’s causing the greatest abundance of trash.”
The Guardian approached Altria, Philip Morris International, Danone, Nestlé, PepsiCo and The Coca-Cola Company.
The Coca-Cola Company said: “We care about the impact of every drink we sell and are committed to growing our business in the right way.” It has pledged to make 100% of its packaging recyclable globally by 2025, and to use at least 50% recycled material in packaging by 2030.
Nestlé said it has reduced its virgin plastic usage by 14.9% in the last five years, and supports schemes around the world to develop waste collection and recycling schemes.
“Since launching our voluntary commitments to address plastic waste five years ago, we have significantly outperformed the market at large in reducing virgin plastic and increasing recyclability, according to the most recent report from the Ellen MacArthur Foundation,” it said.
The company also supports the creation of a global legally binding regulation on plastic pollution which is being negotiated this week.
Danone said: “We continue to strive to reduce our own plastic footprint – between 2018-2023 we reduced our plastic use by 8% equivalent to 62 000 tons and increased the recyclability of our packaging (84% of our packaging is recyclable, reusable or compostable). We continue to support and push for improved collection and recycling infrastructures to help consumers recycle.” They also support “an ambitious and binding … UN Global Plastic Treaty which would represent a major opportunity to unlock and accelerate progress on plastics circularity.”
Both PMI and Altria contest the accuracy of the data collected.
Plastic in the Depths: how pollution took over our oceans
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However, while many of these companies have taken voluntary measures to improve their impact on plastic pollution, the experts behind the study argue they are not working. Plastic production has doubled since the beginning of 2000 and studies show only 9% of plastic is being recycled.
When the team collected data on self-reported yearly plastic packaging production for each of these multinational companies and compared it with the data from their 1,500-plus litter surveys, their statistical analysis showed that every 1% increase in plastic production was directly correlated with approximately a 1% increase in plastic pollution.
“Actually seeing this one-to-one increase, I was like, wow,” says a study author, Kathy Willis, a marine socio-ecologist from the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation in Australia.
“Time and time again from our science we see that we really need to be capping how much plastic we are producing.”
However, Kartik Chandran, an environmental engineer at Columbia University, who was not involved in the research, said that while this new data was striking, the observation that 1% plastic production was equal to 1% plastic pollution was “a bit unrealistic” and “simplistic”.
He said the data did not consider plastic pollution in China, Korea and Japan, nor take into consideration recycling or clean-up initiatives under way.
A better analysis could be based on the net plastic flows into plastic production – also accounting for credits from the reuse of plastic materials – and the net plastic load ascribed as plastic pollution.
The team behind the study, some of whom are participating in the talks being held in Ottawa this week to discuss a UN Treaty for Plastic Pollution, said their findings emphasised the urgent need for a globally binding treaty focusing on production measures.
The talks will run to Monday, and Luis Vayas Valdivieso, the Ecuadorian ambassador to the UK, told the Guardian earlier this week he was hopeful that countries would come together to secure an international legally binding instrument on plastic pollution.
“It is very important we are negotiating this treaty now. The world is in a triple crisis of climate change, biodiversity loss and pollution. But while there are agreements in place for the first two, we have no legislation, no global agreement on plastic pollution.”
He’s back in his happy place, fighting culture wars against invisible enemies conjured up in the paranoid fever dreams of right-wingers. pic.twitter.com/XxXk8sCdRi
Typical hypocrite republican business owner and wealthy person. Vote against anything to help the country and then take credit for any good it does while using it to enrich themselves. Hugs. Scottie
Rep. Mike Kelly (R-Pa.) said the Inflation Reduction Act was “loaded with bad policy and wasteful spending.”
Rep. Mike Kelly (R-Pa.) in the U.S. Capitol on Thursday, Sept. 14, 2023. TOM WILLIAMS VIA GETTY IMAGES
Rep. Mike Kelly (R-Pa.), an outspoken critic of President Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act, used the law to receive a grant to install solar panels at one of his car dealership locations.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture gave a Uniontown dealership owned by Mike Kelly Automotive Group a nearly $315,000 grant to install a 261.9-kilowatt solar panel array, according to the Erie Times-News, the local news outlet that first reported the grant on Monday. The grant is set to save the firm $23,700 per year in energy costs, according to the USDA.
The USDA distributed the grant through its Rural Energy for America Program (REAP). The program has existed since 2018, but the Inflation Reduction Act injected an additional $1 billion into the program dramatically expanding its scope. The federal government then announced that it would distribute that money in grants to rural businesses over the course of 2023 and 2024.
In his official statement following the bill’s passage, Kelly derided the legislation that made those grants possible as the “so-called Inflation Reduction Act,” charging that it was “loaded with bad policy and wasteful spending that will ultimately worsen inflation, expand government, and hurt the middle-class.”
His office singled out the bill’s climate provisions as damaging in bullet points accompanying the statement. “The bill provides $375 billion in so-called ‘climate change’ legislation, which include $7,500 tax credits for wealthy Americans to purchase electric vehicles (EV),” his office said.
Asked how the grant squares with Kelly’s opposition to the IRA, Kelly spokesperson Matt Knoedler referred HuffPost to the statement he provided the Erie Times-News.
“Representative Kelly’s energy policy has always supported an all-of-the-above approach,” Knoedler said. “Additionally, Rep. Kelly does not have an active role in the day-to-day operations of his family’s business.”
In his 2022 financial disclosure, Kelly reported an ownership stake in Mike Kelly Automotive Group worth between $50,001 and $100,000, and a salary from the company of just under $30,000. Kelly also reported a “note receivable” from the company worth between $500,001 and $1 million.
Mike Kelly Toyota, the dealership that got the grant, is located in GOP Rep. Guy Reschenthaler’s district south of the Erie-area seat that Kelly represents.
Preston Nouri, Kelly’s Democratic challenger, is calling on him to return the grant money. PRESTON NOURI FOR CONGRESS
Kelly has represented Pennsylvania’s northwestern corner since 2011 and has not faced a close re-election battle since 2018. Former President Donald Trump carried Kelly’s current district, Pennsylvania’s 16th, by nearly 21 percentage points in 2020.
This year, Preston Nouri, a 25-year-old legislative analyst for the Department of Defense, is the Democratic nominee to take on Kelly.
Nouri called on Kelly to return the money his family’s business received. “Mike Kelly shows his true colors once again,” Nouri said in a statement. “For over 13 years, he keeps getting caught with his hand in the cookie jar, taking taxpayer money to enrich himself while working against the interests of the people he’s supposed to represent.”
Kelly already underwent scrutiny for opposing student debt cancellation after accepting nearly $1 million in Paycheck Protection Program loans during the COVID-19 pandemic that were forgiven. “PPP loans are designed to be forgiven,” Kelly posted on X in August 2022. “Student loans are not. Big difference!”
Kelly is also a staunch Trump ally who has advocated for the rights of people arrested during the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol. During a general election debate in 2022, he condemned the alleged mistreatment of Jan. 6 defendants, asking, “Is this America?”
This is my second attempt to post this, as after I started to post it I realized I might be able to use WordPress’s system of block editor against them. I did not mean for the first one to post but in trying to save it for this one it posted. Sorry. Hugs. Scottie
For those that don’t follow or subscribe to the comments on the blog here, you miss out on the grand comments but the wonderful links a few people like Ali leave knowing they help lift my spirits when I am feeling down or when things crash over me. This was one Ali left a few days ago that because I took one of the few very rare days that I stayed in bed rather than be dragged out by pain or nightmares to stay in bed until 8 am this morning. Even was Ron was shocked when he opened his eyes and seen me there. His first response was “Was I OK” as I rarely if ever stay in bed past 5 am. I honestly can not remember the last time I did. He got really worried until I assured him I was fine, but after not sleeping more than a few hours for the last few nights I managed to do so, and even had good dreams. I know most folks don’t remember their dreams, I wish a lot of times I did not, but most of the time I remember mine, sadly the abusive ones are the most vivid and stay with me long after waking up. Anyway here is the wonderful environmental news that Ali sent me. Hugs. Scottie
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Divers with gloved hands gently nestled the first self-bred corals from the World Coral Conservatory project amongst their cousins in Europe’s largest coral reef at the Burgers’ Zoo in Arnhem, eastern Netherlands, Monday, April 22, 2024. (AP Photo/Peter Dejong)Read More
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A fish swims in a coral reef as divers with gloved hands gently nestled the first self-bred corals from the World Coral Conservatory project amongst their cousins in Europe’s largest coral reef at the Burgers’ Zoo in Arnhem, eastern Netherlands, Monday, April 22, 2024. (AP Photo/Peter Dejong)Read More
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Divers with gloved hands gently nestled the first self-bred corals from the World Coral Conservatory project amongst their cousins in Europe’s largest coral reef at the Burgers’ Zoo in Arnhem, eastern Netherlands, Monday, April 22, 2024. (AP Photo/Peter Dejong)Read More
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Divers with gloved hands gently nestled the first self-bred corals from the World Coral Conservatory project amongst their cousins in Europe’s largest coral reef at the Burgers’ Zoo in Arnhem, eastern Netherlands, Monday, April 22, 2024. (AP Photo/Peter Dejong)Read More
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Divers with gloved hands gently nestled the first self-bred corals from the World Coral Conservatory project amongst their cousins in Europe’s largest coral reef at the Burgers’ Zoo in Arnhem, eastern Netherlands, Monday, April 22, 2024. (AP Photo/Peter Dejong)Read More
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Divers with gloved hands gently nestled the first self-bred corals from the World Coral Conservatory project amongst their cousins in Europe’s largest coral reef at the Burgers’ Zoo in Arnhem, eastern Netherlands, Monday, April 22, 2024. (AP Photo/Peter Dejong)Read More
BY MOLLY QUELL
Updated 3:53 AM EDT, April 26, 2024
ARNHEM, Netherlands (AP) — Just like the animals on Noah’s Ark, the corals arrived in a pair.
On Monday, divers with gloved hands gently nestled the self-bred corals from the World Coral Conservatory project among their cousins in Europe’s largest coral reef at the Burgers’ Zoo in the Netherlands.
“This is the first project where we started to keep these corals with a known origin. As we know exactly where they’re coming from, they have the potential to be placed back into the wild. … So it is very important to keep these corals, as it’s going not very well in the wild,” Nienke Klerks, a biologist at the Royal Burgers’ Zoo in Arnhem, told The Associated Press.
It’s among several projects worldwide seeking to address the decline of coral reef populations, which are suffering from bleaching caused by rising sea temperatures. Corals are central to marine ecosystems, and while these projects won’t stem the tide of damage from human-caused climate change, they are seen as part of broader solutions.
The World Coral Conservatory hopes to create a bank of corals in aquariums across Europe that could be used to repopulate wild coral reefs if they succumb to the stress of climate change or pollution.
Along with two zoos in France and the originator of the project — the Monaco Scientific Center — the zoo in the east of the Netherlands took in more than a dozen coral fragments from off the coast of Seychelles in east Africa.
The Dutch zoo has been propagating the corals since 2022, allowing them to grow in a highly regulated environment before they were large enough to join the rest of the reef.
“We test it behind the scenes … what works for these corals. In that way, we know where to place them and how to keep them,” zookeeper Pascal Kik said.
Each diver held up a coral — one that resembled a large mushroom, the other a decorative cookie — to be photographed by reporters before placing them on a ledge near the center of the 8-million-liter (2.1-million-gallon) tank.
Few of the other corals at the zoo come from the wild. They are either shared by other zoos or turned over by Dutch customs officers after being confiscated. Coral poaching is a major threat to coral reefs in parts of Asia.
That would make it difficult to return the corals to the wild. But the team knows exactly where their 14 corals came from, making it more likely they could be successfully reintroduced if needed.
Corals area keystone marine species, according to Mark Eakin, executive secretary for the International Coral Reef Society. Eakin, retired coral monitoring chief at the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, says that around 25% of marine animals spend some part of their lives dependent on coral reefs.
That makes projects such as the one in Arnhem all the more important to pursue, he said.
“We are in a situation where we really need to be taking any possible action we can,” Eakin told AP.
Earlier in April, scientists from the NOAA and International Coral Reef Initiative said that coral reefs around the world are experiencing global bleaching for the fourth time.
Bleaching occurs when coral under stress expels the algae that gives them their vibrant colors. The algae is also a coral’s food source, and if the bleaching lasts for too long or is too severe, the coral could die.
Terry Hughes of Australia’s James Cook University, an expert on the Great Barrier Reef, argues that the world needs faster, bolder efforts to stop the damage from climate change, instead of small-scale restoration projects like this one.
“You can’t replace a magnificent ecosystem with an aquarium,” he said.
Others say every little bit helps.
“Coral reefs would be one of the first systems to totally collapse due to climate change,’’ said Ronald Osinga, a marine biologist who specializes in corals at Wageningen University in the Netherlands.
“It’s sad that it has to be like this,” said Osinga, who is not involved in the Dutch zoo initiative. But projects like this are a “good backup plan.”
This is what is and has happened in Florida. We moved to the state in 1994, a poor gay couple. But the state was a blue state with an extremely progressive government. I loved the idea of being so near amusement parks I never had seen before. But over the years we have seen our state torn apart as hard right leaning people moved from other northern states to Florida, like we had done. But those people changed the state. They voted Republican, those republicans changed laws about voting, making it harder for people to vote. I once had to give up voting because I showed up at the early voting place only to see a several hour long line. There was no way I could stand that long, at the time I had only one hip joint. But when Ron complained we were told that was the rules, stay in line and vote. Republicans won the election. That is what republicans are doing everywhere they control. It is horrible. We must do what ever we can to resist.
Please read this article. It is and has been our experience. We have seen prices grow so high we struggle today to make ends meet and even buy groceries. Our medical costs are out of sight and imagination. And the republican hard right wants to make our existence as a gay couple a crime. I have talked about how over the last tRump administration, how over the last three years maga thugs have moved in to our area, our mobile home park. They put up pro-tRump posters, signs, and banners all which are against the rules but they are not made to take them down. Our former open and welcoming community divided into with maga or be … shut down and made unwelcome. These maga people have only one setting, they do not believe everyone has the right to their opinion or their political views, you either see it their way or you’re the enemy. Ron and I have withdrawn from most of the community when after the hurricane we were walking around the park and just down the street from us a new move in from NY was offering coffee to people … he had a tRump sign and a slur for president Biden on his home before the hurricane. They were not welcoming to Ron and I to say the least. We had never had that happen in our neighborohood before. Luckily, we had our own big generator that provided for all our needs and also was powering our ill neighbor’s oxygen machine and his refrigerator. We did not need their coffee, we were able to power our own coffee maker and hot plates and a microwave along with our A/c units and Ron’s C-pap. After hurricane Maria Ron insisted we buy a huge powerful generator. After Ian tore up our home and we were without power for three weeks that generator saved us. The name on the generator is The Beast. It really is. Hugs. Scottie
Florida has seen a population boom in recent years, but many longtime residents and recent transplants say rising costs and divisive politics have them fleeing the Sunshine State.
Beachgoers in Cocoa Beach on July 29, 2023, when ocean temperatures reached 101 degrees around the Florida Keys.Paul Hennesy / Anadolu Agency via Getty Images file
One of the first signs Barb Carter’s move to Florida wasn’t the postcard life she’d envisioned was the armadillo infestation in her home that caused $9,000 in damages. Then came a hurricane, ever present feuding over politics, and an inability to find a doctor to remove a tumor from her liver.
After a year in the Sunshine State, Carter packed her car with whatever belongings she could fit and headed back to her home state of Kansas — selling her Florida home at a $40,000 loss and leaving behind the children and grandchildren she’d moved to be closer to.
“So many people ask, ‘Why would you move back to Kansas?’ I tell them all the same thing — you’ve got to take your vacation goggles off,” Carter said. “For me, it was very falsely promoted. Once living there, I thought, you know, this isn’t all you guys have cracked this up to be, at all.”
Florida has had a population boom over the past several years, with more than 700,000 people moving there in 2022, and it was the second-fastest-growing state as of July 2023, according to Census Bureau data. While there are some indications that migration to the state has slowed from its pandemic highs, only Texas saw more one-way U-Haul moves into the statethan Florida last year. Mortgage application data indicated there were nearly two homebuyers moving to Florida in 2023 for every one leaving, according to data analytics firm CoreLogic.
But while hundreds of thousands of new residents have flocked to the state on the promise of beautiful weather, no income tax and lower costs, nearly 500,000 left in 2022, according to the most recent census data. Contributing to their move was a perfect storm of soaring insurance costs, a hostile political environment, worsening traffic and extreme weather, according to interviews with more than a dozen recent transplants and longtime residents who left the state in the past two years.
Young people in Miami demonstrate in 2023 in response to Florida’s crackdown on lessons surrounding race and Black history, and against a string of anti-LGBTQ laws that are affecting students.Eva Marie Uzcategui / Bloomberg via Getty Images
“It wasn’t the utopia on any level that I thought it would be,” said Jodi Cummings, who moved to Florida from Connecticut in 2021. “I thought Florida would be an easier lifestyle, I thought the pace would be a little bit quieter, I thought it would be warmer. I didn’t expect it to be literally 100 degrees at night. It was incredibly difficult to make friends, and it was expensive, very expensive.”
Cummings expected she’d have extra money in her paycheck working as a private chef in the Palm Beach area since the state doesn’t have an income tax. But the high costs of car insurance, rent and food cut into that additional take-home pay. After six months of dealing with South Florida’s heat and traffic, she began planning a move back to the Northeast.
“I had been so disenchanted with Florida so quickly,” Cummings said. “There was this feeling of confusion and guilt about wanting to leave, of moving there then realizing this is not anything like I thought it would be.”
A window air conditioning unit during a heat wave in Miami in 2023.Eva Marie Uzcategui / Bloomberg via Getty Images
While costs have been rising across the country, some areas of Florida have been hit particularly hard. In the South Florida region, which includes Miami, Fort Lauderdale and Palm Beach, consumer prices in February were up nearly 5% over the prior year, compared to 3.2% nationally, according to the most recent data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Homeowners insurance rates in Florida rose 42% last year to an average of $6,000 annually, driven by hurricanes and climate change, and car insurance in Florida is more than 50% higher than the national average, according to the Insurance Information Institute. While once seen as an affordable housing market, Florida is now among the more expensive states to buy a home in, with prices up 60% since 2020 to an average of $388,500, according to Zillow.
For Carter, who made the move in 2022 from Kansas to a suburb of Orlando for the weather, beaches and to be closer to her grandchildren, the costs began to quickly pile up. She purchased a manufactured home and initially expected the lot rent in her community to be $580 a month. But when she arrived she learned her monthly bill was actually $750, and by the time she left it had jumped to $875 a month. Along with the $9,000 in repairs from the armadillos, her car insurance doubled and Hurricane Ian destroyed her home’s roof on her 62nd birthday.
A flooded street in Orlando, Fla., following Hurricane Ian in 2022.Bryan R. Smith / AFP via Getty Images
There were also the ever-present conversations and disagreements over politics that started to wear on her. Carter, who describes herself as a “middle of the road” Republican, said she learned to keep her opinions to herself.
“You cannot engage in a conversation there without politics coming up, it is just crazy. We’re retired, we’re supposed to be in our fun time of life,” she said. “I learned quickly, just keep your mouth shut, because I saw people in my own community break up their friendships over it. I don’t like losing friends, and especially over politics.”
A supporter of President Joe Biden faces supporters of Donald Trump outside of the courthouse in Fort Pierce, Fla., where Trump attended a hearing in his classified records case on March 14.Joe Raedle / Getty Images
But she said the final straw was when she couldn’t find a surgeon to remove a 6-inch tumor from her liver that doctors warned could burst at any moment and lead to life-threatening sepsis. After being passed among doctors, she finally found one willing to remove the tumor. But when she called to schedule the surgery, her calls went unanswered and her messages weren’t returned. After months of trying and fearing for her life, she returned to Kansas to have the procedure done.“It just seemed like one challenge after another, but I kept with it until there was literally a lifesaving event that I needed to get handled and I wasn’t able to do it there,” she said. “I think it was the most difficult year of my life.”
No state has had more residents relocate to Florida in recent years than New York, with 90,000 New Yorkers moving there in 2022, according to census data. Among all out-of-state mortgage applicants, nearly 9% were from New York in 2023, slightly lower than the previous two years but similar to 2019, according to CoreLogic. One of those New York transplants was Louis Rotkowitz. He lasted less than two years in Florida.
“Like every good New Yorker, this is where you want to go,” he said by phone while driving the last of his belongings out of the state to his new home in Charlotte, North Carolina. “It’s a complete fallacy.”
After years working in emergency medicine, and nearly dying from a Covid-19 infection he contracted at work, Rotkowitz said he and his wife were looking for a more pleasant, affordable lifestyle and warmer weather when they decided to buy a house in the West Palm Beach area in 2022. He got a job there as a primary care physician and his wife took a teaching position.
But he said he quickly found the Florida he’d moved to wasn’t the one he’d experienced on regular visits there over the years. His commute to work often took more than an hour each way, he struggled to get basic services like a dishwasher repair, and the cost of his homeowners association fees doubled.
“I had a good salary, but we were barely making ends meet. We had zero quality of life,” said Rotkowitz.
Along with the rising costs, Rotkowitz said he generally felt unsafe in the state between the erratic traffic — which resulted in a number of his patients being injured by vehicles — and a state law passed in 2023 that allowed people to carry a concealed weapon without a license.
A handgun is inventoried at store that sells guns in Delray Beach, Fla., in 2023.Joe Raedle / Getty Images file
“Everyone is walking around with guns there,” he said. “I consider myself a conservative guy, but if you want to carry a gun you should be licensed, there should be some sort of process.”
Veronica Blaski, who moved to Florida from Connecticut, said rising costs drove her out of the state after less than three years. When at the start of the pandemic her husband was offered a job in Florida making more money as a manager for a landscaping company, Blaski envisioned warm weather and a more comfortable lifestyle.
The couple, both in their 40s, sold their home in Connecticut and were starting to settle into their new community when Blaski said they were hit with a “bulldozer” of costs at the start of 2023.
Her homeowners insurance company threatened to drop her coverage if she didn’t replace her home’s 9-year-old roof, a $16,000 to $30,000 project, and even with a new roof, she was expecting her home insurance rates to double — one neighbor saw their insurance go from $600 a month to $1,200 a month.
She was also facing rising property taxes as the value of her home increased, her homeowners association fees went from $326 a month to $480, and her insurance agent warned that her car insurance would likely double when it was time to renew her policy. Her husband had to get a second job on weekends to cover the higher costs.
While Florida has an unemployment rate below the national average, Blaski and others said wages weren’t enough to keep up with their expenses. The median salary in Florida is among the lowest in the country, according to payroll processor ADP. To afford a home in one of Florida’s more affordable metro areas, like Jacksonville, a homebuyer would need to earn $109,000 a year, around twice as much income as a buyer would have needed just four years ago, according to an analysis by Zillow.
“My little part-time job making $600, $700 a month went to paying either car insurance or homeowners insurance, and forget about groceries,” said Blaski, who was working in retail. “There are all these hidden things that people don’t know about. Make sure you have extra money saved somewhere because you will need it.”
A person shops in a grocery store on July 13, 2022, in Miami as the consumer price index soared to 9.1%, marking the fastest pace for inflation since November 1981.Joe Raedle / Getty Images file
When her husband’s former boss in Connecticut reached out to see if he’d be willing to return, the couple leaped at the chance.
The reverse migration out of Florida isn’t just among newcomers, but also among longtime residents who said they can no longer afford to live there and are uncomfortable with the state’s increasingly conservative policies, which in recent years have included a crackdown on undocumented immigrants, a ban on transgender care for minors, state interventions in how race, slavery and sexuality are taught in schools, and a six-week ban on abortions.
After more than three decades in the Tampa Bay area, Donna Smith left the state for Pennsylvania in December, with politics and rising insurance costs playing a major role in her decision to leave.
“It breaks my heart, it really does, because Florida was really a pretty great place when I first moved there,” Smith said.
Having grown up in Oklahoma, Smith considered herself a Republican, but as Florida’s politics shifted to the right, she said she began to consider herself a Democrat. It wasn’t until the past several years, though, that politics started to encroach on her daily life — from feuds between neighbors and friends to neo-Nazis showing up at a Black Lives Matter rally in her small town.
“When I first moved to Florida, it was a live-and-let-live sort of beach feel. You met people from all over, everybody was relaxed. That’s just gone now, and it’s shocking. It’s just gone,” said Smith, 61, who works as a graphic designer and illustrator. “Instead, it’s just a constant stressful atmosphere. I feel as though it could ignite at any point, and I’m not a fearmonger. It’s just the atmosphere, the feeling there.”
She was already considering a move out of the state when she was told by her homeowners insurance company that she would need to replace her home’s roof because it was older than four years or her insurance premium would be going up to $12,000 a year from $3,600, which was already double what she had been paying. Even with a new roof, she was told her premium would be $6,900 a year. Before she could make a decision about what to do, her insurance policy was canceled.
Shortly after, Smith ended up moving to the Lancaster, Pennsylvania, area, where she is closer to her adult children. While the majority of voters in her new county chose Donald Trump in the last election, she said politics is no longer such a heavy presence in her everyday life.
“I don’t feel it is as oppressive. People don’t wear it on their sleeve like they did in Florida,” she said. “When you walk in a room, you don’t overhear a conversation all the time where people are saying ‘Trump is the best’ or ‘I went to that last rally,’ and they’re telling total strangers while you’re just waiting for your car or something. It was just everywhere.”
A supporter of Donald Trump at a Super Tuesday election-night watch party at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Fla., on March 5.Chandan Khanna / AFP – Getty Images
Costs and politics were also enough to cause Noelle Schmitz to leave the state after more than 30 years, despite her son having a year left in high school, and relocate to Winchester, Virginia. She said the politics became ever-present in her daily life — one former neighbor had a massive Trump banner in front of their house for years, and another had Trump written in big letters across their yard. When she put out a Hillary Clinton sign in 2016, it was stolen and her house was egged.“I saw my neighbors and co-workers become more radicalized, more aggressive and more angry about politics. I’m thinking, where is this coming from? These are not the people I remember,” Schmitz said. “I was finally like, we need to get the hell out of here, things are not going well.”
For some Florida newcomers though, politics is the main draw to the state, said John Desautels, who has sold real estate in Florida for decades. While politics never used to be a topic for homebuyers, Desautels said it is now a regular subject his clients bring up. Rather than asking about schools or amenities in a community, prospective buyers are asking him about the political affiliations of a certain neighborhood.
“One of the first things they say is, ‘I don’t want to be in one of them X or Y political party neighborhoods,’” Desautels said. “I spend hours listening to people vent to me about fleeing the communist government of XYZ and they want to come to freedom or whatever. So the politics have been the biggest issue when we get the call.”
Even home showings have become a politically sensitive issue. He recalled showing an elderly woman one property where there were Confederate flags at the gate and swastikas on the fish tank.
But while politics are a lure to people arriving in the state, he said they’re also among the reasons sellers tell him they’re leaving, and the state’s politics have deterred some of his gay or nonwhite clients from moving there.
“The problem is, when we alienate protected classes, it sounds like a good sound bite, but you’ve got to remember those are people who spend money in our community,” he said. “For this pro-business, free state, I’m feeling it in the wallet, bad.”
In Kansas, Carter says it’s good to be home. She moved into a 55-plus community in a small town about 10 miles from Wichita. While in Florida she was paying nearly $900 in lot rent for her manufactured home, she now pays just $520 in rent for a cottage-style apartment — a place she estimates would have cost her $1,800 a month in Florida.
With the money she’s saving in Kansas, she can afford to visit Florida.
“People call me the modern-day Dorothy,” she said. “There’s no place like home.”
A flooded street in New Port Richey, Fla., after Hurricane Idalia made landfall in 2023.Miguel J. Rodriguez Carrillo / AFP via Getty Images
I want to thank Rawgod for this post. See, it is hard for me to hold the information in my head of all of Biden’s hard fought achievements and the ones he is still fighting to accomplish. But Rawgod put it in an easy to read and understand format. See that is what the republicans are trying desperately to obscure. They need and want to keep the public from seeing all the good Biden has done because their candidate screwed everything up only helping out the wealthy with a huge tax cut that benefited … him with large cutouts for real estate developers. WTF! Nothing Biden has managed to do profits him personally, but tRump did. Hugs. Scottie
This goes along with my last post, Christian take over of the US pushed by Churches, leaders with money, and wealthy older people who see it as a way to enforce their bigotry to remain a white cis straight 1950s society. I really want to emphasize the hard right bigotry and hate these billionaires have and the changes they are making to society. They fund the very rabid right wing media that is trying hard to change all of our society and political leanings, increasing hate for LGBTQIA and hate against blacks / brown people. They push a pro Christian white cis straight male in charge of society. Dunn & Wilks also control influential legal, policy, & advocacy organizations. One of those orgs argued in court that pharmacies shouldn’t sell birth control. The lawyer who argued that case later became a federal judge. He banned the abortion pill. And they’ve even created their own right-wing media bubble. Dunn & Wilks fund Texas Scorecard, the top far-right publication. Wilks owns the Daily Wire and bankrolls PragerU, a right-wing “education” platform they’re trying to force into our schools. Prager U is now being used in red state public schools as instruction materials. Florida pushes their message hard. There is a serious push by really wealthy old Christian bigots to turn the US into a Christian Iran, a Christian Saudi Arabia, a Christian Afghanistan. Do we the poor majority want to allow this? Hugs. Scottie
For more than three months, Republican Party of Texas Chair Matt Rinaldi has vigorously attacked critics of Defend Texas Liberty, and rebuffed calls to distance the state party from the powerful group over its ties to white supremacists. As he did so, Rinaldi was also working as an attorney for one of the group’s two billionaire funders, Farris Wilks, according to filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Since 2021, Wilks has given nearly $5 million to Defend Texas Liberty, which last year was the state party’s largest financial supporter. With Rinaldi’s help, the group has sought to purge the Texas GOP of more moderate voices by bankrolling far-right causes and primary candidates. Publicly, Rinaldi has also been silent about Defend Texas Liberty as the Tribune extensively reported on ties between the group and other white supremacists and Nick Fuentes acolytes.
Read the full article. There’s much more. Give the tweets below a minute to fully load because they illuminate how deep this goes. The final tweet links to a grimly fascinating deep dive into Defend Texas Liberty’s leader.
Texas GOP Chair Matt Rinaldi backed a group with white supremacist ties — while working for its billionaire funder https://t.co/2h63antXz5
These two billionaire-pastors are spending their fortune enacting an extreme Christian nationalist worldview in the second-largest state in the country.
In his teens and his 20s, Jonathan Stickland was a prolific internet troll.
He later made a career of it — ascending to the role of a conservative Texas powerbroker, before taking heat for hosting a meeting with white supremacist Nick Fuentes. https://t.co/vvMwzjDh22
Y’know that old saw that goes, “If you enter a room and there are 12 Nazis having dinner at the table and you sit down to join them, there are now 13 Nazis at the table”?
Rinaldi, Dunn, Wilks, Strickland and the rest of these guys are the ones who catered the meal.
Two billionaires funding right wing hate groups and Nazis. And both are pastors.
Who said that it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle then it is for a Richmond to enter the kingdom of heaven?
Who said the greatest commandment after loving God was loving your neighbor?
Who said not to store up treasures on earth?
no one of any importance whatsoever to modern fundamentalist Christianity. One could almost wish that they succeed turning Texas into a theocracy and the right wing state. Maybe they can leave the union.
I think it reveals that they don’t even believe their religious nuttery. They just want to use superstition and money to control EVERYTHING, and they also think they’re so smart that no one will pick up on the hypocrisy
Actually, they are heretic “Christians”. https://en.wikipedia.org/wi… Wilks’ parents founded their own church (cult?), which denies Christian doctrines like the Trinity and the divinity of Christ, and gives primacy to the Hebrew Scriptures. While they seem to recognize Jesus as a prophet of some sort, they don’t seem to be bound to follow his teachings.
And look! Wilks is the pastor of his own church cult. Currently the Assembly of Yahweh (7th day) is a conservative Jews for Jesus-type congregation. It teaches that “the true religion is Jewish (not a Gentile religion)” and its members celebrate the Old Testament holidays rather than those related to the New Testament. The congregation considers the Old Testament historically and scientifically accurate.
Plastic pollution on a Welsh beach. Volunteers collected and surveyed plastic waste across 84 countries over five years. Photograph: Paul Quayle/Alamy
Scottie's Playtime 