Source: Tax Foundation, http://www.taxfoundation.org/research/show/266.html
Note: Ratios are for 2005. I excluded DC, Virginia, and Maryland due to their abnormally large amounts of Federal spending due to the location of the Federal government.
Saturday, September 20, 2008
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This is something that I always figured could be true. In a lot of rural areas, federal dollars are doled out for large corporate and middle sized independent farms. Moreover, here in the South, job opportunities are fewer (anecdotal) and the education systems are worse. By nature of my work, I encounter lots of people on SSI and disability (SSDI). It sometimes works like a makeshift unemployment benefit. It incentivizes people to be disabled and unable to work at all than to have a disability and perform some light work. Light work doesn't get you Medicaid.
ReplyDeleteI'd be interested in seeing if rural "red" states (or areas) received higher per capita welfare (not just any federal money) expenditures from the federal government and how that compares with overall needs based expenditures of "blue" areas. I imagine that some blue urban areas could have larger city tax revenues to compensate for a lower amount of federal spending.
I've long wondered when the Democratic strongholds (urban and some exurban areas with above average economic growth) would eventually tire of subsidizing the less densely populated Republican areas who often seem ignorant of how much government spending augments their local economies. Not that this would be good thing, especially not for those of us living in rural communities, but if I hear one more person say how horrible government spending is without acknowledging how much they benefit....