Quote:
Has President Bush and the Republican Congress redirected the federal budget to reward the 30 “red” states who voted for him in 2000? We analyze state-level data from the Tax Foundation that considers taxation and federal spending to determine the extent to which each state is a net recipient or net contributor to the federal budget. According to these data, red states receive, on average, $0.29 more net federal benefits than blue states. Under Bush, the gap between “red” and “blue” states increased. We find that the gap between blue and red states did not originate with the present administration, nor is Republican representation in Congress a major factor in predicting whether a state is a net recipient of federal grants. Instead, we find that the current divide between red and blue in patterns of federal taxation and funding is primarily the product of a socio-economic chasm between affluent states that vote Democrat and poor states that vote Republican. However, we also find that the “reddest” states, where Bush faired best in the 2000 election, were the largest net recipients of federal benefits even after controlling for demographic factors. The “reddest” states also benefit when we analyzed net increases in federal grants from 2000 (Clinton’s last year in office) to 2003 (the most recent year with data available for the Bush administration). Consequently, entitlement and large discretionary programs that came to define the Democrats’ “New Deal Coalition” now disproportionately benefit Republican states, which in turn, may serve to fortify Republican support in presidential elections."
