The Texas secession movement is almost as old as the state itself, with groups of citizens continuing to push for independence decade after decade. The movement even picked up some steam last summer after the 'Brexit' vote in Great Britain, and gained some company after last fall's election of Donald Trump to the presidency. Now, those secessionists may have some new ammunition to use for their cause, thanks to a study compiled by an Austin-based group called Spare Foot.
Spare Foot has released a report called If Texas Were A Country to measure how the Lone Star State would stack up against other nations of the world on a series of categories. Spare Foot states that it is not an endorser of Texas secession, but instead did this as a "purely fun and educational exercise."
"It's just kind of a Texas pride thing, to say hey, if Texas were a country it'd be the tenth largest economy in the world," says Brian Shreckengast, marketing manager for Spare Foot. And when it comes to land mass, don't mess with Texas either. "One of the most surprising (findings) is that if Texas were a country, by total area it would be the 39th largest country in the world out of 200 countries," he says.
When it comes to population, Texas would still rate in the upper half of the world's nations. "We would be actually the 50th largest," says Shreckengast. "What was surprising to me is that we're a little bit larger than North Korea."