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>subsidizing rural America to the tune of trillions of dollars I'm not sure where you're getting that number from. Here's a federal budget breakdown for FY2016

>subsidizing rural America to the tune of trillions of dollars I'm not sure where you're getting that number from. Here's a federal budget breakdown for FY2016 [1]: Non-discretionary spending: Social Security: $910 billion Medicare: $588 billion Medicaid: $368 billion Other: $563 billion Interest payments: $241 billion Discretionary spending: Defense: $584 billion Non-defense: $600 billion Spending on Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, interest payments, and defense would not decrease if rural citizens moved to the city. Thus those subsidies aren't solely for rural America, so I won't include them in your "trillions of dollars" claim unless you want to make the claim that the government is subsidizing both rural and non-rural citizens to the tune of trillions of dollars, which nobody would doubt. The rest of the budget adds up to $1,163 billion dollars. Even if you made the wild assumption that all that money went straight into the pockets of rural Americans, it's hardly trillions of dollars. (Note that I'm ignoring state budgets. But I think the trillions of dollars assertion is so absurd that I'm not going to waste the time to look up those stats as well.) [1] https://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/images/pubs-images/52xxx/52408-Land-Budget_Overall.png https://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/images/pubs....

icebraining 9y ago
Parent never said "per year".
ideonexus 9y ago
The problem is that you can't look up those stats. They don't exist. I'm not talking about Federal Budget alone or roads alone. I'm talking about Federal Taxes, State Taxes, and Local Taxes as they apply to roads, electric lines, sewage, bridges, community centers, and the myriad other projects that go into supporting a healthy community. There is a well established flow of taxes from urban areas to rural areas. We frame it as a progressive flow of taxes from high-income to low-income, but much of that low-income is tied to geography. I think the reaction to my post reinforces this. Comments in support of NY's export of low-income citizens out of the city have been up-voted. But, as I predicted, observing that rural Americans are consuming more public services than they pay for has drawn outrage. It's easy to call homeless people a problem, but people get angry when you point out how reliant they are on the government for their rural lifestyle.
- Veratyr 9y ago
  > The problem is that you can't look up those stats. They don't exist. Yes you can. You can obtain just about every budget online, whether it be state, federal or local. The person you're replying to showed you the federal budget which you seem to have conveniently ignored: https://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/images/pubs-images/52xxx/52408-Land-Budget_Overall.png https://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/images/pubs... You can see on that chart that the chunk which might apply to "roads, electric lines, sewage, bridges, community centers [...]" is the "Nondefense" chunk, which is $600b, or about 15% of the total federal budget. I can't be bothered listing the budget for every state in the country but they're there. As for local budgets, they're going to apply to the local area.

icebraining 9y ago

Parent never said "per year".

ideonexus 9y ago

The problem is that you can't look up those stats. They don't exist. I'm not talking about Federal Budget alone or roads alone. I'm talking about Federal Taxes, State Taxes, and Local Taxes as they apply to roads, electric lines, sewage, bridges, community centers, and the myriad other projects that go into supporting a healthy community. There is a well established flow of taxes from urban areas to rural areas. We frame it as a progressive flow of taxes from high-income to low-income, but much of that low-income is tied to geography. I think the reaction to my post reinforces this. Comments in support of NY's export of low-income citizens out of the city have been up-voted. But, as I predicted, observing that rural Americans are consuming more public services than they pay for has drawn outrage. It's easy to call homeless people a problem, but people get angry when you point out how reliant they are on the government for their rural lifestyle.

Veratyr 9y ago
> The problem is that you can't look up those stats. They don't exist. Yes you can. You can obtain just about every budget online, whether it be state, federal or local. The person you're replying to showed you the federal budget which you seem to have conveniently ignored: https://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/images/pubs-images/52xxx/52408-Land-Budget_Overall.png https://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/images/pubs... You can see on that chart that the chunk which might apply to "roads, electric lines, sewage, bridges, community centers [...]" is the "Nondefense" chunk, which is $600b, or about 15% of the total federal budget. I can't be bothered listing the budget for every state in the country but they're there. As for local budgets, they're going to apply to the local area.