It's coming up on five years this April that I escaped Washington. I lived there a few weeks shy of 21 years. It was a beautiful state with fairly agreeable politics when I arrived on the great ship USS Rodney M. Davis (FFG 60) in Everett on May 5, 1998.
By 2015, I started looking into transferring out of state with my job because things were starting to slide towards no bueno. My divorce in 2017-2018 fast-tracked my move, as I had to sell my house and I couldn't afford to purchase anything else within commuting distance of my job. In late 2018, I got a break when a colleague hooked me up with a transfer to Detroit of all places! At first, I was beyond skeptical; but the more I researched, the more I liked Detroit.
I ended up getting a raise to come here, and then pay got restructured so now I make much more than I did in Washington. The cost of living is much less. I paid $130k for a house 3.5 years ago--it would have cost me at least $450k for a comparable house in Western Washington! Gas is running me $2.67 a gallon currently.
The downside is that car insurance is insane in Michigan, and there's an income tax here. Currently, Lansing is Democrat, but that cycles back and forth in these parts. Washington just seems to creep further and further left as the years go by. Hell, Trump leads Biden in the most recent polls here, which is something you would never read about Washington.
The best part of moving here? People are not afraid to drive the speed limit or above and they tend to keep the fuck out of the passing lane unless they are actively passing traffic. I set my cruise control to 9 MPH over and stay to the right--even at rush hour! Try that on I-5 or I-405.
Fancy that... CavVet and I are neighbors now, kinda!