Ok....somebody has to let you in on some common knowledge for folks who have been living in Idaho longer than four years:
We've been battling it out with the likes of Mississippi and New Mexico for the title of poorest state in the union since the bottom fell out of the timber industry in the 80s. We've made progress...we're now 44th in household income, having passed economic power houses like West Virgina and South Carolina. We literally haven't been on the right side of prosperous since the gold rush.
Entitlement? We have one of the highest Federal entitlement participation rates in the nation, when comparing total unemployed to the number of those people filing for unemployment claims. Higher than Oregon and much, much higher than California. Idaho is a proud state with conservative values but let's not pretend it's all roses outside of Eagle or Nampa or wherever you so proudly call home. Go ahead and announce your disdain and disgust for people who accept federal checks in a town like Buhl, Blackfoot or Shoshone. Go ahead, we'll wait and see if you walk out of there when you turn your chin up at those folks. Welfare programs are very much in our DNA--at a participation rate that's more than twice that of Comifornia.
For those of us who have been here longer than this century, the influx of newbs spouting about their new found freedom Mecca is entertaining at best, albeit slightly nauseating. The COVID migratory group is particularly ignorant to the realities of the Gem State. And as a heads up, most of Idaho's politically conservative history is due to its LDS residents and the direction of the church. Watch what happens when the Church green lights industrial hemp or someday welcomes homosexuality (gasp!). As goes the Church, so goes Idaho, historically speaking. While I have always cherished Idaho's libertarian leaning management, don't go thinking Tucker Carlson or McCarthy are calling the shots up here.
You might also be upset upon learning that your new home has a decorated history of defending it's natural resources and access to public land from privatization at all costs. That history is fiercely bipartisan and a beautiful hybrid of old school libertarian and conservation oriented values. Just ask Representative Simpson or the late Frank Church.
But absolutely do carry on. We love all the new folks here who can't be bothered to smell the sht outside of the roses. We can't have you stop bragging about leaving the dreaded California for paradise, now, can we?
