I am surprised you did toss out the rich versus poor angle on this. Can you imagine all the Republicans aboard one of those ships?
Never get them to leave unless they can take all their goodies along with them! Be nice to get all that type in one ship and make sure it goes to a destination that no one else will ever visit! They all deserve each other! Though I have read a couple of "Lost Colony" type science fiction stories were they tried the "Lords and Serfs" type of thing, usually turned out badly though!
Like the Blue Adept series.
That and part of the Honor Harrington series and couple of others!
and hear about the remaining democrats destroy the country since they caused all business to move away after ultra-regulation and increasing wealthfare state as who wants to work when money is given to you? The economy would destroy itself since no one wants to push the "cart" anymore.
lamparty
I really believe it was more along the lines of not having all your eggs in one basket! There is no way that you could ever move everyone off the planet! Well, unless things got so bad that there weren't that many left in the first place! The Chinese alone can replace their population faster than you could load them aboard a ship!