“It will be a selling point when it comes to trying to lure people with same-sex partners who are being wooed for a job,”  M.V. Lee Badgett, a University of Massachusetts economist who studies gay and lesbian issues, told Reuters.

Gay and lesbian couples who are part of the “creative class” – highly educated professionals, entrepreneurs and artists – were 2.5 times more likely to move to Massachusetts in the three years following the approval of same-sex marriage, according to a study released in May by the Williams Institute of the University of California.

The relocating couples were more likely to be younger and female than before same-sex marriage was approved.

Even straight members of the “creative class” regard states with marriage equality as more appealing places to live.

“It broadly suggests you have an environment in which people who are seen as different are accepted,” said Gary Gates, the UCLA demographer  and the lead author of the study.

See the full Reuters story here.

The legislators’ work is spurred by last year’s state Supreme Court decision that concluded same-sex couples have the right to wed in Connecticut. The state’s 2005 civil union law doesn’t give same-sex couples equal status of married heterosexual couples, the court said.

The General Assembly’s judiciary committee is considering a bill to remove gender references in current state laws and transform same-sex civil unions into legally recognized marriages as of October 2010. The bill was the subject of a committee hearing Friday.

The measure also would strip language from a 1991 state anti-discrimination law that says Connecticut does not condone gay marriage and will not set quotas for hiring gay workers or encourage teaching in school about same-sex lifestyles. Some lawmakers consider the language outdated and unnecessary.

The proposal to delete that language has upset opponents, who think the court ruling could be used to affect policy in other matters such as school curricula.

The Family Institute of Connecticut, which calls the court ruling undemocratic, said on its Web site that changing the 1991 law “goes beyond mere legislative housekeeping.”

Peter Wolfgang, the organization’s executive director, told the committee the proposed changes could be interpreted by “some enterprising judge” or others as encouragement to teach about homosexual lifestyles in schools.

“We don’t want this misread as some sort of affirmation, some sort of mandate, that things that are opposed to in parental rights or traditional public beliefs will now be taught in the public schools,” Wolfgang said.

Waterbury resident Robert Muckle Sr. told lawmakers he worries about the effect on children if same-sex relationships are condoned or encouraged by educators.

“Things are bad enough in our schools with the teaching of comprehensive sex education without the added promotion of homosexuality and bisexuality,” he said.

State Rep. Michael Lawlor, D-East Haven, co-chairman of the judiciary committee, said the 1991 language prohibited actions that were never likely to occur anyway, such as setting quotas for hiring gay workers or pushing teachers to promote homosexuality.

It was added only to appease people who otherwise might have blocked the anti-discrimination bill, Lawlor said.

The language is a vestige of past discrimination that should be removed, said attorney Bennett Klein of Boston-based Gay and Lesbian Advocates & Defenders (GLAD), which represented the gay couples who won the Supreme Court decision.

“It’s meaningless language other than to express prejudice,” he said.

State Rep. Beth Bye, D-West Hartford, whose ceremony with her partner, Tracey Wilson, was Connecticut’s first same-sex marriage, said the updates to state law are much more than mere procedure.

“Marriage has meaning in our culture, and marriage has meaning in our state and to my family,” Bye, displaying her marriage license, told fellow lawmakers Friday.

The judiciary committee did not act Friday on the proposed changes, which would require full General Assembly approval.

Only Connecticut and Massachusetts have legalized gay marriage, although the unions were legal in California for five months until a state referendum to ban gay marriage passed last fall.

Vermont, New Jersey, California, New Hampshire, Oregon, Washington and the District of Columbia have laws that either recognize civil unions or domestic partnerships that afford same-sex couples similar rights to marriage. Thirty states have gay marriage bans in their constitutions.

Connecticut had 2,140 civil unions recorded as of Friday, including 24 since the Oct. 10 Supreme Court decision.

Some church and conservative group leaders also want lawmakers to let Connecticut justices of the peace and anyone else with religious objections -such as wedding photographers or florists – refuse to participate in same-sex ceremonies.

“A situation has been created by the (court) decision where state policy seriously conflicts with the religious beliefs of a large number of people within the state,” said David Reynolds, a spokesman for the Connecticut Catholic Conference.

The law would exempt clergy from performing same-sex marriages based on their religious beliefs. However, some legislators say justices of the peace are state officials and must perform the ceremonies, since they are legally prohibited from discriminating based on sexual orientation.

Fifty-three percent said they agreed with the ruling while 42 percent disagreed.

The poll of 502 likely voters was conducted by the University of Connecticut poll for the Hartford Courant newspaper.

Support was highest among Democrats with 72 percent approving of the ruling. Sixty-nine percent of Republicans disapproved.  Among independents support stood at 52 percent. The poll had a 4.4 percent margin of error.

The Connecticut Supreme Court ruled on Friday that gay couples have the right to marry, making the state the third behind Massachusetts and California to legalize such unions through the courts.

“Interpreting our state constitutional provisions in accordance with firmly established equal protection principles leads inevitably to the conclusion that gay persons are entitled to marry the otherwise qualified same sex partner of their choice,” Justice Richard N. Palmer wrote in the ruling.

The decision has infuriated social conservatives who have called for a constitutional convention.

Every 20 years, voters can force a convention during which delegates can rewrite the entire constitution. It’s a long, painstaking process that could cost millions and, by coincidence, it’s on the ballot this November.

“This is our one opportunity for the people to have a voice, for the people to be heard, for them to decide whether marriage will be protected as between a man and a woman,” said Peter Wolfgang, executive director of the Family Institute of Connecticut.

Every 20 years, voters can force a convention during which delegates can rewrite the entire constitution. It’s a long, painstaking process that could cost millions and, by coincidence, it’s on the ballot this November.

“This is our one opportunity for the people to have a voice, for the people to be heard, for them to decide whether marriage will be protected as between a man and a woman,” said Peter Wolfgang, executive director of the Family Institute of Connecticut.

On Friday, the state Supreme Court ruled that Connecticut would be the third state, after California and Massachusetts, to allow gay marriage. The court said Connecticut’s 2005 civil union law doesn’t give same-sex couples the same status as married heterosexual couples.

Unlike California, where next month’s ballot referendum will decide whether to outlaw gay marriage, Connecticut voters are being asked to consider only if they want a constitutional convention. If so, convention delegates would be appointed by the state General Assembly, which is largely comprised of Democrats who are sympathetic to same-sex issues.

State Rep. Mike Lawlor, co-chairman of the legislature’s Judiciary Committee, said he’s not sure everyone understands the constitutional convention process.

“It is a very elaborate, months-long process in which a group of people basically rewrite the whole state constitution,” he said. “It costs millions of dollars and requires a special statewide election. If you just want to make a specific amendment to it, which it sounds like they are talking about, then there is a lot easier way to do it.”

That would be the legislative amendment process, which typically requires a three-quarters vote of both General Assembly houses to put a constitutional amendment on the ballot.

There have been 30 amendments passed since 1965, the last time the state held a constitutional convention.

Wolfgang said his group has not ruled out seeking an amendment from lawmakers, but is focusing on getting out the “yes” votes in November.

“The real battle will be Election Day,” he said. “Even in a state with a legislature as liberal as ours, we have defeated our opponents year after year through the legislative process. They could never have gotten same-sex marriage through the Democratic process. Democracy is gay marriage’s worst enemy.”

Republican Gov. M. Jodi Rell, a gay marriage opponent who also supports amending the Constitution to allow for initiatives and referendum, said she is “firmly convinced that attempts to reverse this decision either legislatively or by amending the state constitution will not meet with success.”

Andrew McDonald, the Judiciary Committee’s Senate co-chairman, said he expects the General Assembly to take up gay marriage next year – but only to codify the Supreme Court’s ruling, and not to attempt to change the state’s constitution.

“I continue to expect a bipartisan effort to eradicate any remaining vestiges of discrimination,” he said.

Lawmakers will have some issues to discuss, such as what to do with state’s civil unions law, which remains in effect. More than 1,500 civil unions have been granted since the General Assembly approved them in 2005.

Attorney General Richard Blumenthal said new marriage forms eventually will be needed, but in the interim, clerks can make them more gender neutral by simply crossing out references to man and woman or husband and wife on current forms.

The ruling does not mean churches or synagogues must perform same-sex marriages, but some are expected to embrace the new law.

“I think there is great rejoicing, although we are aware that for some people this is troubling and difficult,” said. Rev. David Foy Crabtree, Connecticut conference minister for the United Church of Christ. “People come out all over the map on it, but among our clergy there is a very, very high percentage who will respond very favorably to this.”