Redistribution. Gotta love it; keeps me employed.

Mark's graphic shows that New Mexico received about $2.00 from the big old nasty Federal government for every $1.00 New Mexico sent to Washington.

Said another way, New Mexico got a lot of help with their state budget from the Federal "welfare" they soaked up. In fact, New Mexico received the most subsidy of any state.


This is like a grown man boasting about balancing his household budget while his rich parents send him an allowance every month.

It also shows that NJ is an awful state full of blue collar workers that get nothing back in return for the steel used for all the buildings and growth in this area for federal contracts.

nifty...i dont have the advantage of understanding modern economics. as far as i'm concerned it is modern economics that put us in this mess to start with. complicated schemes to make money gambling on debt and crooked politicians who pander and bail out people who made bad choices using modern fuzzy math with our money; we need to go back in time where you make a dollar and spend a dollar. if you abolish the irs, the fed and remove .gov from our lives then the above graph would become a mute point right?

either way, i think we can all agree that over time we have moved away from personal freedom, personal responsibility and self reliance, qualities that made americans great and a country is only as good as its citizens. our nation is in financial trouble, i am not down with voting for the lesser of the 2 evils, i decided some years ago i would no longer participate in bandwagon politics and to cast my vote for freedom.

by the way when was that graph made up? do those numbers reflect the time when johnson was governor of nm or is it a current assessment? johnson was in office from 92 to '00 wasn't he?

Gee it might be fairly easy to balance a state budget if you’re getting over 2 dollars in federal assistance for every one dollar your citizens have to pay.

Also fun to note that Texas is the only solidly red state that isn’t a freeloader on the federal dole.

Florida 0.97

That is much better than I expected considering all the retirees down here. How are we not in the red here?

Dont hate the player.

I thought you were a proponent of redistribution? Bro, you got to make sure that everybody’s got a shot.

Take from the populous, business friendly, wealthy states and give to the rural through SS, Medicaid, etc.

I serisouly cant believe you have agnst towards the system. What do you expect? Seriously.

Derp, I want a more progressive tax structure so the wealthy give more in tax revenue. Derp, I hate when we take from the well-off in blue states and give to the needy that happen to be living in red states. DERPy DERP derp.







what's really annoying is that the never show PR or DC on the list, at something like 6% and 8% return repectively.

Got to call out the hypocracy.

I need to balance that graph with a few points, though -- namely, that one can't look at state budgets as if each state is a perfect microcosmic economy that can be compared and contrasted.

New Mexico has things like Los Alamos, massive Native American reservations, and tons of Federal land. It's not unexpected that a state that is responsible for a lot of Federal mandates will receive a lot of Federal assistance to fund those mandates.

Of course, other states have military and research bases, NA reservations, Federal land, etc. But a better analysis would take into account those things, not just a bare ratio of taxes paid to assistance received.

Florida is a huge economy. We were in the red from about 2008 to about 2010 or 2011 if I recall correctly. It's been a little while since I went through the primary source data.

To clarify, the Federal payments are payments made from D.C. to the state, not things like Social Security payments made to the individual.

Proper modern economics only tells what is. It can give guidance on what should be, but that's largely subjective.

You are also conflating crime, fraud, and shitty politics with economics. :)

Yes, because you would have a bunch of individual city-states or Somalia-style nations. ;)

Mark may be able to clarify the dates included, but the general trend and positioning has been in that ballpark going back at least 20 years.

You can't really call it hypocracy because they work the system. They would be doing a diservice to their citizens if they did not take advantage of federal funds that are made available to them.

The only way you can call it hypocracy is if they say the system should change and then take no steps to change it. This is happening too, don't get me wrong, but what you said is not a valid conclusion.

I have to admit being more of a classical liberal myself I admire much of the Libertarian thinking. I do find however when one gets elected in our current political system of government usually only the portions of their policies that are in high alignment with Fascist Ideologies ever see the light of day. I am also highly skeptical even if they could implement enough of their ideologies into our government system that you could call it Libertarian in nature that it would create anything resembling a stable economy for the long term.

dont worry. I go to sleep VERY happy and VERY easily at night.

:party:

so what you are saying is the graph you put up is not a true representation since it does not take all those other factors you just mentioned into account and therefore not reliable...is that fair or do i have you wrong?

Excellent points in your post there. I would add one more: that ultimately, all of this internal rebalancing is a huge advantage that the United States has that the European Monetary Union does not.

Because the graphic is imperfect does not mean it should be thrown out. While NM might receive more Federal spending due to things like military spending, most of that feeds in to the state economy (e.g. paychecks to troops).

Here's what I would say:

The chart, limited as it may be, refutes those who support Gary Johnson because he supposedly used "small government principles" to balance New Mexico's budget. He may have been adept at managing the state budget, but the Federal budget operates under different circumstances (most notably, there's no superior government from which to receive financial assistance).

However, the chart should not be taken as a complete and nuanced representation of how state budgets work, either, for the reasons I listed earlier. The chart doesn't prove that Gary Johnson was a bad governor or is incapable of managing a government budget; it's possible that Johnson was a good governor, is capable of managing a government budget, and that his budgetary skills may transfer over to a Federal budget equally well. The chart simply disproves the argument that we can know these things based solely on New Mexico's "balanced" budget.

are you meaning those are the only ideologies put in place or that those are the only ideologies pointed at by the opposition? i dont know of any ideology libertarians hold that can be considered fascist by its definition.

if a libertarian ever gets in office, i have to say they would find it hard to implement much since it would mean making big cuts and no one will want to stop suckling from the cash cow, that is unless he also held the majority in the house and senate which wont happen until the people had enough.

thank you for your explanation. now...when i hear the term "small government principles" its not just about balancing a budget. yes a physically smaller, fiscally responsible government would use less money and therefore have a balanced budget ergo efficient government, no bigger than what it needs to be to provide the services they are supposed to provide. to me, smaller government is more so less intrusion into private life, less regulation and more individual freedom. a government that distances itself from issues like gay marriage, abortion and the personal right to do with one's body as he or she pleases so long as it does not affect your neighbour, that is small gov. a government that is not in my business watching me all the time, regulating what i say, what i watch, how i raise my children.

You can call it hypocrisy when the congresscritters from the Red states that are getting all of this money are calling people out for "big government spending". If only there was some legislative body to which they belong that could set a federal budget?

And waiting for fox news to say "well he's just supporting the other black guy"