Friday, March 31, 2017

Blue State Subsidies



David Post over at Volokh had a discussion about blue states subsidisng red ones at the federal level.  There is a lot that he leaves out of the statistics.  Military bases, purchasing power, racial and age demographics, entitlements, and Washington DC itself. Just for openers. Other than that, a rather typical argument. Blue people rate higher, or want to move to whiter, younger, less-military places, with fewer children and not-employed people, claim they have other reasons. Maybe next election they’ll threaten to move to Mexico instead. Could be.  I don’t think many are explicitly thinking to themselves “Vermont! Yeah! There’s hardly any black people there. The old people have moved to Florida and because they’re liberals there aren’t many children.”  They’re more likely think “Attractive area.  Big on education and safety nets. Nice people, from what I can tell.” It’s the nice people part where the smuggling occurs. They see what they are including, but not what they are excluding.

So do we all. 

2 comments:

  1. "Blue people rate higher, or want to move to whiter, younger, less-military places, with fewer children and not-employed people,..." Whiter? That's raaaaacist. Younger with fewer children? Killing yourselves slowly. Less-military? There are so many places with no military bases. The blue folks don't want them, so naturally they have to pay the red states to have them.

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  2. Oh dear, blue states... you've got all those patents! All those universities to produce ideas. IDEAS, I say! Whatever will you do with them without red state plumbers, pipefitters, electricians, ironworkers, carpenters, heavy equipment operators, painters, roofers, masons, machinists, locksmiths, welders, truck drivers, loggers and sawmillers, cooks, farmers, airplane pilots, cattlemen, IT and network technicians, and... oh the list can only get longer and longer.

    And, of course the military and policemen. It would be so wonderful if the world were all in harmony and peace reigned so they wouldn't be necessary, but... dangit, I just don't see that happening real soon. In fact, if peace were to reign, it would be the blue states with their lofty ideas that would be out of work. All the others would still have jobs because life would continue... because, peace... right?

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