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This has been gone over numerous times as to why you are wrong. New Mexico for example which typically votes Democrat always tops these list by a wide margin. They have a low population of about 2 million but numerous very expensive federal facilities there. Sandia National Laboratory by itself with a budget of 2.4 billion adds $1,200 to the federal per capita spending for that state. While one can easily argue New Mexico benefits from that spending the primary beneficiary of the work done there is the entire nation.
That is not welfare, whether that facility is located in NY or NM the primary beneficiary does not change.
Sure, New Mexico is still an anamoly. Look at the other top states and you'll see that it isn't the hated Connecticut or New Jersey.
No, voters in Alabama shouldn't trash and demean the federal government and expect others to pick up the tab.
I only see you doing that. And that isn't how it works anyway. Politicians come up with these programs to buy votes. As we saw this week, votes are important.
It's obvious from the posts on here that Trump supporters think they don't need us "coastal elites." Think again. Let's cut off all the federal dollars poor red states receive and Trump supporters will realize how much they need us "godless liberals" when their states go broke. Imagine how much California or New York could improve without all their money flowing to Alabama, Mississippi, Kentucky, or West Virginia.
Now, I'm not completely serious but its fun to point out the hypocrisy.
the high federal dollars are the funding of the military bases you dummy.
It's not an anomaly, and this is only one example. Here is another one, people often retire to Florida. Not only does that cause an increase in federal spending in Florida it decreases the tax revenue.
Another example? Large corporations typically have their headquarters in large urban areas where the taxes they pay on income is attributed too, if you take something like a natural gas corporation the real business end of that corporation is in rural areas.
Looking at chart of raw data and trying to say your taxes are flowing to rural areas is entirely too simplistic.
It's obvious from the posts on here that Trump supporters think they don't need us "coastal elites." Think again. Let's cut off all the federal dollars poor red states receive and Trump supporters will realize how much they need us "godless liberals" when their states go broke. Imagine how much California or New York could improve without all their money flowing to Alabama, Mississippi, Kentucky, or West Virginia.
Now, I'm not completely serious but its fun to point out the hypocrisy.
Red states always harp about the deficit and then suck up the most money in federal assistance, pretty typical projection on the conservative state level.
Projection is a psychological tool one uses to deflect their own behavior onto others. Conservatives have done this since Reagan was elected.
I-80 goes from New York City to San Francisco, who benefits from the spending on that road going through rural areas? The people in rural areas near it that don't really need it unless they are engaging in commerce or the massive amount of commerce being conducted over it coast to coast?
Since you mentioned Mississippi I'm sure you know it's namesake is the Mississippi river. This is a massive corridor for commerce that the US spends a lot of money on in all the states it goes through. Those federal dollars benefit the nation as a whole.
I'm no Trump fan but this whole "red states are welfare bums" argument is specious.
Rural areas are conservative and urban areas are liberal. Look at any election map of the US by county for the evidence. In reality, there are no Red States or Blue States; there are Red Counties (mostly rural) and Blue Counties (mostly urban).
Raw materials from the rural areas (read: crops) need to get to the cities somehow, usually with government roads.
It's also handy for products and people to travel on interstates between cities. Often, there are rural areas between cities.
Military bases also tend to be in rural areas where land is cheap and fewer people complain about the noise.
My point: obviously the "per capita" public infrastructure costs are going to be much higher in sparse rural areas than in dense urban areas.
Then you have the deep blue state of Maryland which receives back $1.35 for each $1.00 of federal taxes paid. Virginia, a now supposedly blue state, is similar.
When you start talking federal properties in various states keep in mind that every single square inch of them is tax exempt so the home state is losing massive amounts of revenue even with fees in lieu of, which are never the full taxable potential.
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