back in may when NC passed Amendment 1, one of my old left-wing nut job professors stated that:

"Economic progress is tied to social progress in ways that Amendment 1 advocates do not want to understand"

"There are good reasons why you find Facebook, and Google, and Apple, and a million others, located around the outskirts of cities like Seattle and San Francisco and New York City and Boston and not cities like, say, Nashville or Houston or Birmingham or Oklahoma City"

"Tolerance is good for business"

my response: i don't fully buy into the idea that economic progress is linked to social progress. let me give an example.

if people like him were saying things like this regarding racism during the 60s, he'd look like a jackass today. other than dallas, houston (yes, houston), nashville (yes, nashville), austin (to an extent; location of university of texas), memphis, new orleans, atlanta, durham (to an extent; location of Duke University), orlando, and miami, there hasn't been much recognizable economic progress in southern cities to go along with social progress. even though there were huge gains in social progress, all of the big name companies were still not interested in locating to southern cities. the main reason is that cities like birmingham, oklahoma city, little rock (AR), baton rogue (LA), tulsa (OK), charlotte & durham (NC), richmond (VA), lexington & louisville (KY), austin & el paso (TX), san antonio, jacksonville & tampa (FL), and columbia & charleston (SC) are too small to attract big-name companies.

along with social progress, you also need a bit of a population boom in order to attract companies like Google and Apple. the reason why big-name companies like Google and Apple are primarily in places like New York & L.A. is that their populations are in the millions. companies (i assume) locate to places with huge populations (you need people to keep your company going) and might not care either way about the amount of social progress in that city.

if social & economic progress were linked together (based on my example), cities like birmingham and oklahoma city would have the population of cities like dallas and miami, while cities like dallas and miami would have the population of cities like New York and L.A.

when the day comes where gays are accepted in southern cities, i really, really doubt that it will spark recognizable economic progress in those cities. social progress may be necessary, but a huge population is more necessary.

which do you believe:
1. social progress alone leads to economic progress

2. a huge population + social progress= economic progress

3. a huge population alone leads to economic progress