Dependency

The Real Culture of Dependency

By Bill Maher

Now that tax day is upon us, it might be a good idea to look at who’s benefiting from federal taxes and who’s getting hosed. WalletHub.com just published their 2015 analysis of which states are most and least dependent on the federal government, and once again it’s the red states who are the welfare queens and the blue states who are footing the bill. New Jersey is the “least dependent” state, while Delaware is the state that gets the least return on their federal taxes (31 cents on the dollar!). And yes, the fiercely anti-Democrat, anti-tax Deep South states still lead the league in dependency. And irony.

If you use the results of the 2012 elections as a guide, when it comes to ranking the least dependent states from 1 to 50, blue states average 18.3 and red states average 33.2.

Part of the reason for this is that Congress is now so heavily Republican. According to analysis from Vanderbilt professor David C. Parsley, “These transfers are heavily affected by congressional efforts to direct funding to their home states.” But even he points out the obvious – the states where there are a large amount of poor people and old people should get more money than the folks who need it less. So the red states actually deserve more of the money, even though it would be nice if they were a little less douche-y about it.