Federal Spending Received Per Dollar of Taxes Paid by State, 2004

[Tannertu]

Tax Foundation

I also added what party the state voted for in the 2004 presidential election.

1. Washington D.C. ($6.64) (D)*
2. New Mexico ($2.00) (R)
3. Alaska ($1.87) (R)
4. West Virginia ($1.83) (R)
5. Mississippi ($1.77) (R)
6. North Dakota ($1.73) (R)
7. Alabama ($1.71) (R)
8. Virginia ($1.66) (R)
9. Hawaii ($1.60) (D)
10. Montana ($1.58) (R)
11. South Dakota ($1.49) (R)
12. Oklahoma ($1.48) (R)
13. Arkansas ($1.47) (R)
14. Louisiana ($1.45) (R)
15. Kentucky ($1.45) (R)
16. Maryland ($1.44) (R)
17. Maine ($1.40) (D)
18. South Carolina ($1.38) (R)
19. Tennessee ($1.30) (R)
20. Arizona ($1.30) (R)
21. Missouri ($1.29) (R)
22. Idaho ($1.28) (R)
23. Utah ($1.14) (R)
24. Kansas ($1.12) (R)
25. Vermont ($1.12) (D)
26. Iowa ($1.11) (R)
27. Wyoming ($1.11) (R)
28. North Carolina ($1.10) (R)
29. Nebraska ($1.07) (R)
30. Pennsylvania ($1.06) (D)
31. Florida ($1.02) (R)
32. Rhode Island ($1.02) (D)
33. Ohio ($1.01) (R)
34. Indiana ($0.97) (R)
35. Oregon ($0.97) (D)
36. Georgia ($0.96) (R)
37. Texas ($0.94) (R)
38. Washington ($0.88) (D)
39. Michigan ($0.85) (D)
40. Wisconsin ($0.82) (D)
41. Delaware ($0.79) (D)
42. Colorado ($0.79) (R)
43. New York ($0.79) (D)
44. California ($0.79) (D)
45. Massachusetts ($0.77) (D)
46. Nevada ($0.73) (R)
47. Illinois ($0.73) (D)
48. Minnesota ($0.69) (D)
49. New Hampshire ($0.67) (D)
50. Connecticut ($0.66) (D)
51. New Jersey ($0.55) (D)

*Washington D.C. was placed at the bottom of the list as n/a for state ranking, but deserves to be #1.

Should the fiscally conservative Republicans refuse? Should the Democrats be happy to give to the less fortunate?

It would be interesting to see this correlated with "propensity to whinge about welfare".

 

[Ecofarm]

Thats a terrible idea.

The opposite is true. Politicians play musical chairs with jobs, the legislative process becomes bogged down (legislating is an actual skill you know, that takes training), and, the worst part, unelected groups, like lobbyists and party bosses, become super powerful.

You misunderstood. I propose 1 term per office. Once as govoner, once as a mayor. If you want to continue to work in government, you haver to move up or down in position. If you served as city commish, mayor, govoner, rep, and senator, that = ~12 years. 12 years does not a career make, and you would have to be elected by people from outside your current pork barrel to continue service at each level change upward.

Career politicians are the cancer of our democracy.

Being a politician has become such a career in America, that we have cases of a senator/rep doing a favor (vote) for another sen/rep becauseof something one rep's father did for another as a result of a lobbiest that no longer exists. That is NOT the will of the people and must be stopped.

Holding public office should be something you volunteer to do for a period of time, and then you go back to your life. It is not supposed to be a life of power and glamour. Of course some government jobs need professionals, but not representative of the people.

 

[Brighteye]

It sounded interesting. Can someone tell me why the average isn't $1? It looks as though you have much more Federal spending than you pay in taxes overall.

 

[Godwynn]

It sounded interesting. Can someone tell me why the average isn't $1? It looks as though you have much more Federal spending than you pay in taxes overall.

We have a hellacious deficit.

 

[Irish Caesar]

It sounded interesting. Can someone tell me why the average isn't $1? It looks as though you have much more Federal spending than you pay in taxes overall.

We have a hellacious deficit.

Did you weight the dollar amounts by state population first?

Many of the states on the top of the list have low populations, and many on the bottom of the list have high populations. The list only measures amount paid back per dollar; a state like New York is going to put a lot more dollars in than Mississippi.

 

[Godwynn]

Did you weight the dollar amounts by state population first?

I did not. I already know we have a deficit in the 12 digits.

 

[Integral]

It sounded interesting. Can someone tell me why the average isn't $1? It looks as though you have much more Federal spending than you pay in taxes overall.

The Federal yearly deficit is about $250 billion. ish. It's been worse; at one point back a few years ago the yearly deficit was about $800 billion.

The debt, or cumulative sum of all deficits, currently runs at about $9 trillion or roughly 3/4ths of GDP...IIRC

-Integral

EDIT: Or, I could just go straight to the horse's mouth...

Source: Bureau of Economic Analysis, NIPA table 3.2 (2006)
Federal government current reciepts: $2,495.8 billion
Federal government current expenditures: $2,715.8 billion
Net government saving: -$220.0 billion <--That's the deficit

 

[Irish Caesar]

I did not. I already know we have a deficit in the 12 digits.

I think that's our debt; our deficit is significantly smaller, although still nothing to brag about.

 

[Godwynn]

I think that's our debt; our deficit is significantly smaller, although still nothing to brag about.

No, our debt is 13 digits, $9,000,000,000,000.

Our deficit is in the hundreds of billions.

 

[Fugitive Sisyphus]

There are 10^11 stars in the galaxy. That used to be a huge number. But it's only a hundred billion. It's less than the national deficit! We used to call them astronomical numbers. Now we should call them economical numbers.
-Richard Feynman

 

[Cuchullain]

Remember, some of those R states have D congressional delegations.

And vice versa. New Jersey usually leans Republican (although not by much; the state is generally right of center, rather than 'comfortably" to the right).

That helps to explain why our economy is in the toilet.

 

[Cuivienen]

Some of it is partisanship, and based on which party controls Congress, but much more of it is simple wealth. Wealthier states always get the short end of the stick in terms of government spending because the government focuses on rejuvenating "troubled" (poor) areas while taxing equally across all areas.

That is not to say that such a discrepancy is necessarily the wrong way to go about things. To some extent, I feel that the government tries too hard at ameliorating poverty and not hard enough at maintaining the middle class, but the discrepancy should certainly exist.

On the issue of a partisan trend in the numbers, states that vote Democratic also tend to be wealthier than states that vote Republican. Economically, it makes little sense if you assume the Democrats are left-wing and the Republicans right-wing, but there you go.

DC, of course, has very high government spending because the federal government also acts as the state government.

 

[QuoVadisNation]

And vice versa. New Jersey usually leans Republican (although not by much; the state is generally right of center, rather than 'comfortably" to the right).

That helps to explain why our economy is in the toilet.

Well, that, and that New Jersey is a state that's also horribly, horribly corrupt with questionable mafia connections, a state where a significant portion of the budget goes to supporting an unnecessary amount of towns and courts, and is also a state where yet another exaggerated sum of money goes to feeding the pigs*. New Jersey's economy, and budget, is always in trouble because too many civil servants are being supported and all Hell would come forth if you even thought of cutting them off.

cops

 

[Irish Caesar]

No, our debt is 13 digits, $9,000,000,000,000.

Our deficit is in the hundreds of billions.

Ah, my mistake.



I knew the debt was in the trillions, I suppose I should have realized that an order of magnitude less was still 12 digits...