Why is Louisiana losing population compared to other red states?

[satsuma]

South Louisiana has a recurring issue with hurricanes. Katrina was a historic disaster that drove large numbers out of New Orleans permanently, and this decade, New Orleans and Houma were again hit by Ida. Lake Charles suffered an exodus due to Laura, which may scar the area worse than Rita did.

North Louisiana is predominantly rural, and its largest city Shreveport is in long-term decline from loss of manufacturing.

The thriving parts of Louisiana at the moment are more like the I-12 corridor (Baton Rouge to Slidell) and Lafayette. These areas don't draw enough to counterbalance the losses elsewhere.

To dampen the Florida stats a little (AZ, DE, and SC too?), a retirement destination will always be positive on domestic migration because people go there... and then die rather than move out. Louisiana isn't a retirement destination. Perhaps it even hurts somewhat that it's near the Texas Triangle with its massive growth.

The argument that tax policy gets partial credit for red-state dynamism? Louisiana falls flat here. The Tax Foundation ranks it close to AL and AR but otherwise firmly in the company of blue states, with a relatively high sales tax and corporate income tax. 

[satsuma]

Does Louisiana have literally any beaches?

Grand Isle way down at the bottom of Jefferson Parish is probably the most famous one.

Yep, there's no developed beach resorts like in the other Gulf Coast states. Cameron Parish has a mostly beachy coast though. I've been to Holly Beach.

[satsuma]

No large, distinguished research universities. Best school in the state is Tulane which isn't big enough or STEM-focused enough to have big economic knock-on effects like software or biotech firms. LSU is a football fan club whose members occasionally attend classes.

I don't think Louisiana is a laggard in higher ed relative to its other neighbors. It only looks bad because it's right next to Texas, with its oil-rich Longhorns, Aggies, and Rice. Louisiana is unusual in that it even has Tulane, maybe 5th in prestigious Southern private universities? Also 3 med schools, 3 law schools and a biomedical research center. But I do get the impression that Tulane attracts students from far away who aren't interested in remaining nearby after graduation.

As a contrast, Idaho is #1 on net migration per capita. Its main 3 public universities are not nationally prominent and it has the Mormon safety school as its top private university, but Boise gets considered an emerging tech hub, because any techies moving there are already college-educated. A state that attracts young / mid-career adult migration has basically outsourced its workforce education to wherever they came from.

Does climate change have any impact on car insurance rates? Louisiana has some of the highest.

Marginally.  Your vehicle is more likely to get flooded or damaged in a storm down here.  But the one thing states with high auto insurance rates have in common is this:  lots of uninsured drivers.

Yeah I've paid auto insurance in both Louisiana and Texas. The Louisiana rates are much higher. A perfect driver there probably pays as much as a bad driver elsewhere. The state's higher rates of crime, crashes, lawsuits, and so on, those don't help. With fair warning, most people are likely to drive their cars out of the state to evacuate, but something like Hurricane Harvey hovering over Houston flooded so many cars. I rode that one out at my workplace and it was a close call.