If we were to decide that local homogeneity of values is something we wanted to encourage—which I’m not sure of—a subsidy for moving costs would probably help, but I don’t think it’s sufficient to overcome the inertia that keeps e.g. Texans with Californian values in Texas. People have lots of ties to a place besides the purely financial: moving implies leaving friends and often family, finding a new job and new housing, probably learning a certain amount of new cultural content, etc.
If we were to decide that local homogeneity of values is something we wanted to encourage—which I’m not sure of—a subsidy for moving costs would probably help, but I don’t think it’s sufficient to overcome the inertia that keeps e.g. Texans with Californian values in Texas. People have lots of ties to a place besides the purely financial: moving implies leaving friends and often family, finding a new job and new housing, probably learning a certain amount of new cultural content, etc.
I wouldn’t expect such a subsidy to overcome inertia in all cases. I expect it would help on the margins, though.