If you have come across any social media post even closely related to North Carolina — whether it be tourism, foodie accounts or fun-fact videos — you’ll inevitably find a large collection of anti-migrant sentiments. Colloquial terms such as the acronym of Cary as the Concentrated Area of Relocated Yankees have become commonplace.

We need to realize this disdain for newcomers in the state is fundamentally harmful to the continual growth and prosperity of North Carolina and does nothing to address the causes and possible solutions.

North Carolina has historically been a home for domestic migrants. As Chris Laws, assistant teaching professor in the Department of History, explained, the early days of the North Carolina colony were dull until domestic migrants came in.

“From about 1715 to 1760, you see the majority of folks coming into North Carolina are coming from other colonies,” Laws said. “They’re coming from Pennsylvania, from Maryland … because there’s this availability of land that’s not there in Virginia and in the middle colonies.”

Migration in the state has seen spikes and stagnation alike, but with every rise in migration, North Carolina has been the better for it.

For example, Laws noted the influx of Northerners, deemed carpetbaggers, in the 1850s led to higher rates of abolitionist sentiments compared to the rest of the South.

“When you’re talking about the political culture, North Carolina is very divided,” Laws said. “Even during the Confederacy, the peace movement that happened during the Civil War was the largest in North Carolina. In some places, it was almost like [its own] civil war.”

Another key migratory moment was the establishment of Research Triangle Park in 1959. At its creation, North Carolina was one of the poorest states in the country with dismal projections for its economic future.

With the development of RTP, North Carolina, which had been largely populated only by those from North Carolina, began to diversify. In 1960, over 83% of North Carolinians were born in North Carolina. By 2018, just 56% of people were born in North Carolina and the population had doubled from 1960 levels.

With this came an economic boom we are still seeing today, with the Raleigh-Durham-Cary area significantly above the national average in terms of per capita income. The miraculous economic turnaround in North Carolina is directly attributable to domestic migrants.

Clearly, the mass migration of people outside the state has been crucial in the development and prosperity of the state. So why are people still blaming migrants for North Carolina’s current issues?

The United States has been wracked with hardships due to a rapidly growing housing crisis. In New York City, a survey of housing and vacancy statistics by the U.S. Census Bureau found 53% of renters in 2021 were considered rent-burdened — or dedicating more than 30% of their income to housing.

It’s not just New York, though. Boston has a rent-burdened rate of 52%. Chicago’s rate is just over 51%. All of this spells mass migration away from urban centers. While cities like San Francisco house and attract the wealthiest Americans, they drive out others who simply cannot afford to live there anymore.

People in these cities are being priced out of their homes and must find refuge somewhere else. As the NC Office of State Budget and Management points out, states like California and New York are seeing massive net losses as a result of domestic migration, while states like North Carolina, Texas and Florida are seeing massive net gains.

Here in Raleigh, rental prices grew the fastest of any city in the country in 2022. While rental price growth has slowed down since then, the shockwave impact has left many in Raleigh and other Southern cities reeling.

Unfortunately, the City of Raleigh has done more to exacerbate the problem of wasteful spending and capitalist greed than to address the problem of growing demand — which, again, is not the fault of migrants who are already fleeing worse conditions elsewhere.

There are many examples to look at. There is a $350 million project in North Hills for a luxury apartment complex. There is a $1 billion project in “The Exchange” for two mixed-use luxury office and apartment buildings connected via sky bridge. There is a $2.2 billion mixed-use entertainment and luxury housing plan in Downtown South.

Meanwhile, the city continues to bleed affordable housing units, losing 45,000 units over the last ten years. While the city spends hundreds of millions on luxury apartments, it agreed on a measly $80 million affordable housing bond in 2020. That bond has built or preserved only 3,439 affordable housing units since FY15-16, a far cry from the already weak promise of 5,700 units and nowhere near a healthy replenishing rate.

North Carolinians have every right to be concerned about this housing crisis, but the dismal view among the citizenry has led to a worrying rise in anti-migrant sentiments. We need to stop blaming people for coming in and start rightly blaming the people who have favored developers and the wealthy over people fleeing economic hardship.