The Real Welfare Queens?

9Comments

1. 1.

   Matthew

   February 15, 2003 at 6:19 am

   John, those are pretty sad numbers, although I’d be interested in seeing population figures alongside the states, since with a few notable exceptions like Connecticut, small states are going to lack the tax base to achieve a balance of taxation and federal transfer payments.

   For all the talk of Republican “enablers,” I’m left wondering why no one calls the Democrats enablers also, since the Democrats object not to Bush’s deficit spending (in fact, they want more of it), but to his tax plan. Regardless, I’m going to go bury my face in my hands now.

2. 2.

   tnr

   February 15, 2003 at 11:53 am

   What year is this data from? Just curious.

   Which Democrats want a bigger deficit?

3. 3.

   etc.

   February 15, 2003 at 1:22 pm

   Nice work John!

   I think this state by state analysis is only the tip of the iceberg, however. Here in Washington State, there is a great debate about highway funding. The state breaks out the gas tax revenues by counties, and the reliably democratic counties are the net contributors, and the reliably republican counties are the net beneficiaries. Since the democratic counties also have the lion’s share of the jobs and population, it is likely that federal taxes and spending on a county by county basis follows a similar pattern.

   Also, this break out captures only the cash transactions. Import quotas on sugar and peanuts, for instance, have no direct cost to the government, but benefit a select group of rural residents.

   There are also good arguements that the Bureau of Reclamation (irrigation), the Bureau of Land Management (grazing land), and the Forest Service (trees), all represent non cash subsidies to rural areas.

   Now if one assumes that all democrats live in big cities and all republicans live in rural areas, and assigns a number to the non cash items, the money given by democrats to republicans becomes truly enormous.

4. 4.

   Ricky

   February 15, 2003 at 3:52 pm

   A. Military spending (contractors & bases).
   B. It includes all federal outlays, which includes the biggest outlay sector, social security. And as we all know, the elderly move to MASSACHUSETTS or VERMONT instead of the south upon retirement.

   Were someone to do a district by district comparison, omitting defense & social security, & I’ll be interested.

5. 5.

   etc.

   February 16, 2003 at 11:31 am

   Ricky, you have a point about social security, but I think the defense spending issue is more complex. For instance, Boeing builds F-16s in the St. Louis, Mo. area, and is headquartered in Chicago, IL. Does a federal contract for F-16s accrue to St. Louis, or Chicago? Does the jet fuel bill for McChord AFB accrue to Tacoma, WA (where the fuel is used), Anacortes, WA (where the fuel is likely refined), or Prudhoe Bay, AK (where it likely is pumped from the ground), or the site of the oil company headquarters? Also, to what extent is the location of military bases discretionary? There is a darn good reason why there are no Navy bases in Colorado, but what reason determines that the Army operates Ft. Carson in Colorado instead of somewhere in Utah?

6. 6.

   dave

   February 16, 2003 at 8:06 pm

   “Again, clearly this is a simplistic way to look at things, because it has not taken everything into account…”

   Translation from wingnutese: “I fucked this up beyond all comprehension, and the real numbers don’t tell the story I want, but hell will freeze over before I admit I was wrong.”

7. 7.

   John Cole

   February 16, 2003 at 8:50 pm

   No, moron. This is just a simplistic way of looking at things. It showed exactly what I wthought it would show, but it does not take into account about 100 other things. Goodness, you are an annoying troll.

8. 8.

   David Perron

   February 17, 2003 at 8:32 am

   For instance, Boeing builds F-16s in the St. Louis, Mo. area, and is headquartered in Chicago, IL.

   Uh, no. Boeing builds F-18s. Lockheed Martin builds F-16s.