Looking to future, demographers worry about education, opportunity
At a popular restaurant last week, two sociologists — both in dark suit coats, both professors at Rice University, both experts on demographics of Houston and Texas who happen to live on the same floor of the same museum district high-rise — met mefor lunch and ordered the same thing, the beef tenderloin sandwich.
There, many of the similarities ended. Andthat was the point.
For years, as I listened to the breathless, often glass-half-full presentations of Stephen Klineberg about the intriguing diversity of Houston, which he likes to call “a portrait of America’s future,” I asked myself: “What would Steve Murdock say to this?”
Murdock was Texas’ first state demographer and a Bush-appointed former U.S. Census bureau director who for more than 40 years tried to educate everyone from lawmakers to business people about the state’s rapidly changing population and the implications for our future. But his take was always a bit more sober, his audiences across the state sometimes a bit less friendly. Perhaps, as a result, Murdock’s glass is a little less full.
I asked both to join mefor a couple of hours, to sit across the table from each other and talk about where Houston is today and where we’re headed.
“This whole transition, this epic transition of the population …” Klineberg began.
“Epic transition,” Murdock muttered. “Not just a transition — an epic transition.”
They laughed. Klineberg is a master at employing adjectives to keep audiences from dozing off during his lengthy PowerPoint sessions using dozens of charts and statistics.
“None of us are optimistic when you look at what’s actually happening in the state,” Klineberg says. “Where my optimism comes, to the extent that it does, is from the surveys that track increasingly positive views.”
Klineberg is talking about the Houston Area Survey he has conducted for 35 years, which asks about a range of issues, from traffic to crime. In recent years,
Klineberg has measured an increasing acceptance of the city’s diversity, support of gay rights, concern about economic inequalities, less antagonism toward immigration and even growing support for a path to citizenship for those here illegally.
“Do views make reality?” Murdock asks.
“So,” Klineberg continues undeterred. “The question is why is there such a disconnect between public opinion and politically effective leaders.”
We all know that the answer has to do with Texas’ staggeringly low voter turnout rates, partially fueled by redistricting efforts that protect incumbents and have left few competitive districts. But Murdock asks Klineberg how he can be sure that people are being honest.
Klineberg acknowledges the challenges all researchers face in accurate sampling. But he says the trend over so many years is firm: Houstonians are becoming more progressive in their thinking.
“Andyou find the actions going with those how?” Murdock asked. “I don’t care if my neighbor loves me. If he still puts his junk in my yard, I’m not going to like him.”
“But if everyone in the neighborhood says increasingly ‘we don’t want this junk in people’s yards,’ you have some confidence that you can begin to move the needle,” Klineberg responded.
We start talking about diversity, and Klineberg believes the city has a culture of accepting the inevitable. Perhaps the same thing that led past leaders to desegregate swiftly and peacefully, without the riots of other Southern cities, is what moved Mayor Sylvester Turner to make sure both the police and fire chiefs were Hispanic.
Murdock says that part of Houston’s peaceful coexistence may be due to its high segregation, in terms of income and education.
“That’s how we handle it,” Murdock says. “We’ve said: ‘Yeah, we’ll have diversity. You people look like you should live over there. These people look like they should live over here.’ ”
They agree that income is the great divider. People of different races, faiths, speaking different languages won’t have a problem living on the same street if they are all doctors, lawyers and folks with professional degrees.
Meanwhile, education is supposed to be the great equalizer. It’s the No. 1 predictor of socioeconomic status. And public education policy in this state is the one area that seems to concern both professors the most.
Texas lawmakers have repeatedly cut funding and turned a blind eye to blatant disparities in public schools.
Hispanics make up more than half of the public school enrollment in this state.
Yet, 34 percent of Hispanics under 18 grow up in poverty. Hispanic enrollment at the state’s two flagship universities hovers around 20 percent. Only one non-judicial statewide elected official, Land Commissioner George P. Bush, is Hispanic.
“We know that 65 percent of all the jobs that will exist in America in 2020 will require some kind of certificate or degree beyond high school. And27 percent of all the people in Harris County schools get any education out of high school,” Klineberg says.
He is encouraged by what business groups such as the Houston Partnership are doing to support education reforms, like more access to pre-kindergarten.
“It’s not just because they care about children,” he says. “It’s because they recognize we’re not going to make it if we don’t have an educated workforce.”
Murdock says that he may have been naïve to think policymakers would get the message sooner, or that, by now, political representation would be more reflective of the population, which is 39 percent Hispanic in Texas. When he first started talking about race decades ago, people would walk out of his speeches. He didn’t account for the resistance or the partisans whowould respond to his data by getting organized, redistricting and supporting policies to stave off political effects of demographic change.
For both men, the message is clear: if Texas doesn’t educate and provide opportunities for Hispanics, we’re doomed.
“I’ll stand up in front of anybody anytime and say, look, the socioeconomics that go with our demographics, if we don’t change those, we’re going to be a poorer, less competitive state, poorer, less competitive nation than we are today,” Murdock says.
“But,” I interrupt, “you’ve been saying that for decades, and they’re not listening. So are we headed to Third World status?”
“Let me say this,” Murdock responds. “I have an increasing number who come up to meand say, ‘you know, you’re right.’ ”
“Think what happens if it doesn’t change,” he said. “I don’t want to predict what people will do. But those type circumstances are worrisome. People keep asking, well, are you saying we’re going to have riots? I’m not going to say that.”
But the consequences of inaction are as inevitable as population change itself.
Nobody should be comfortable with that. We ended our lunch knowing that the realities of Houston and Texas are far from philosophical conversation at a nice Rice restaurant.
But the answers are there for the taking, and it’s time for all of us to listen.