

This amount is strictly for the September-December 2012 quarter










Source: Reuters

Comments     Threshold


RE: Grats!
By ClownPuncher on 2/21/2013 2:13:51 PM , Rating: 2
States like CA and NY help subsidize the Federal funding for states like AK. I'm not at all defending CA or NY, just poiting out that AK is a state that takes in more dollars than it pays "back".

RE: Grats!
By Solandri on 2/21/2013 6:45:10 PM , Rating: 2
That's almost entirely due to the progressive income tax. If you tax rich people at higher tax rates, then states with a bigger percentage of rich people pay more taxes than they receive federal funding. States with a bigger percentage of poor people receive more than they pay out.

If the poorer states tend to be conservative and are telling you they don't want the social welfare money, while the richer states tend to be liberal and say they want to give more social welfare money, and the liberals control the government and get their way, you can't really blame conservatives for the way the numbers work out.

RE: Grats!
By ClownPuncher on 2/21/2013 7:59:03 PM , Rating: 2
I wasn't blaming, just adding another detail. Alaska is a bit of a special case when you talk about taxes and revenue.

Like I said, I do not defend CA or NY. I wouldn't live in either state.

RE: Grats!
By tng on 2/22/2013 8:23:08 AM , Rating: 2
Well, I was only talking about the state finances, CA and NY are running horrible debt on a statewide level. Since I spend time in both I notice that many people in both states will tell you about how backward places like Utah are, yet ignore all the stupidity in their own backyard.

RE: Grats!
By talikarni on 2/22/2013 1:38:02 PM , Rating: 2

That is factually false. States like CA and NY actually receive a LOT more total federal funding than they pay out. The issue comes in that many sources only show "per capita" or "per resident" which makes it look like AK gets all these massive funds. When you look at the amounts actually received per state regardless of population, CA tops the charts with over $300 Billion per year. Compare that with the "#2 per capita" state of VA that received $136 Billion, less than half that of CA. When it comes to total amount actually received, AK is actually one of the lowest with an average less than $5 Billion received per year.

When it comes to AK: due to its size, most of the federal funding is not for the people but actually maintaining and protecting its massive swaths of undeveloped pristine natural lands, that really have very little impact good or bad to or from the people, and is unable to pay anything back in the process. Money received in AK actually goes towards its designated target, unlike most blue states.
Reid has managed to get the same kind of funding to protect the deserts of Nevada, which he then routes to big corporate interests in Vegas and Reno.

If you look at the voting map, typical "blue" states tend to receive in the range of 30-50% more than "red" states, looking at overall funding amount, not "per capita" or "per resident" amounts.

