Let's talk fiction. Today's topic: Blue State Bailouts

My own favorite fiction author is Sen. Graham.

Yesterday, on some news channel, I heard him revisit one of his favorite themes: "blue state bailouts", or, as glp posters are fond of calling it ... "blue state welfare".

It's an old theme in political fiction, but it has been thrust to the front of the genre since COVID, with more populated states that may need more federal assistance during a pandemic are on the receiving end of the vitriol ... "blue state bailouts."

OK so before we really delve into this let's set some ground rules. Blue states votes for Biden or Clinton, Red States voted for Trump. This analysis starts in 2016.

This has to be articulated because there are some states that throw party loyalty and idealism out completely, and they vote unabashedly in their own "taker" interests, electing Democrat Senators and Representatives while voting solidly Republican for President (WV, I'm looking at you. You are Red.)

So ... in the game of federal taxes versus federal moneys received, there are clear "givers" and clear "takers". It's all there in the numbers.

This is a big topic with a lot of qualifiers, and lots of ways to count (isn't all accounting like this?!?) ... so don't go spouting off about National Parks, Montana. We know snowcapped mountains are EXPENSIVE ... so EXPENSIVE they can't maintain themselves on their beauty alone ...

Exhibit A. Business Insider lists the ELEVEN STATES WHO ARE GIVERS, and the ratio of give to take. This is the best metric, overall. Taxes in, tax money out. The list is in alphabetical order, though, which means this article sucks. Here is the link:

[link to www.businessinsider.com (secure)]

Here is another one. It talks about how FORTY out of 50 states TAKE more out than they put into to the federal coffers. It doesn't list the 10 "donor"/"giver" states either ... because no one wants to hear that ...

[link to www.voanews.com (secure)]

However after some digging, I was ablet o find a list of the ten givers vs the 10 takers without all the noise:

[link to worldpopulationreview.com (secure)]

Basically, Connecticut, New Jersey, Massachusets and New York subsidize the taker states to the tune of THOUSANDS per capita.

Thousands. $4000 in Connecticut, $2500 in New Jersey - per capita federal income taxes that we pay in ..; but no one in our state is drawing out.

What's up with that?

I have so many questions. ... do the politicians who spout off about "blue state baliouts" and "blue state welfare" know this? Do they know that the average South Carolinian receives as much federal aid as the average New Jerseyan pays in, "unreimbursed"? To the tune of $2000-4000 a year, per capita?

Do all you guys who support this "blue state bailout" propaganda think it's different than I laid out above?

Or, would you just rather not talk about THAT part?