I know a lot of conservatives and Red state residents would just wish for the Blue states to either disappear or form their own country so the Red State people would be left alone to do their own thing. I’m not sure Red state people realize what a financial hit their states would take. Lets take a group of Blue states that conservatives revile as Coastal Elites versus a group of Red states. Here is a summary of Federal Tax Receipts by state versus Federal disbursements by state. The disbursements include Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare along with personnel costs of Federal offices and military bases along with Federal grants for infrastructure like highways etc. The data is from the Tax Foundation for 2013 which is the latest where I could match tax receipts and disbursements.

The differences are not so pronounced as some Blue state politicians like to scream about. Nonetheless, certain states, like my own New Jersey, get screwed and some states like South Carolina make out like bandits. As a group the Blue states face a shortfall of $54 billion while the Red states enjoy a surplus of $156 billion. One of the results of states facing a shortfall in Federal Tax payments vs Federal payments is their state taxes have to increase to make up for the negative economic impact of sending more money out of state than they get back and still provide for the services their population need.

Please note that the West Coast elites are still doing okay with our Federal tax and disbursement system. California, Oregon and Washington collect about $21 billion more than they send to D.C. It’s the East Coast Elites who come out with the short straw. However what this charts shows most of all is that the Republicans who screamed about needing to eliminate the SALT deduction so Red States would not have to subsidize Blue States taxes were spouting pure unadulterated B.S.
Federal
Taxes Federal
State Paid Payments
California $334.4 billion $343.7 billion
Oregon 25.7 billion 32.7 billion
Washington 59.9 billion 72.9 billion
Massachusetts 90.5 billion 75.6 billion
Connecticut 53,7 billion 41.4 billion
New York 231.9 billion 195.3 billion
New Jersey 128.1 billion 82.6 billion
Delaware 20.1 billion 9.0 billion
Maryland 56.3 billion 93.0 billion Coastal Elites 1000.6 billion 946.2 billion

Alabama 23.8 billion 56.8 billion
Arkansas 28.8 billion 28.5 billion
Georgia 74.3 billion 88.5 billion
Idaho 8.7 billion 15.1 billion
Kansas 24.7 billion 24.2 billion
Kentucky 27.7 billion 48.0 billion
Louisiana 40.2 billion 44.7 billion
Mississippi 10.4 billion 34.3 billion
Montana 5.0 billion 10.1 billion
Nebraska 23.8 billion 15.6 billion
North Carolina 66.1 billion 93.9 billion
Oklahoma 30.1 billion 37.9 billion
South Carolina 20.4 billion 48.8 billion
Tennessee 53.9 billion 64.5 billion
Texas 249.9 billion 234.5 billion
West Virginia 6.8 billion 21.3 billion
Red State 694.6 billion 866.7 billion