4 ms·

> 6. Exorbiant state fuel tax (27th highest in the nation). Sounds more like a median state fuel tax.

zelon88 8y ago
All by itself sure. Other states usually go one way or another. Tax more here but a little less over there. MA taxes everything across the board. After factoring in all the other expenses you can easily stand back and call the whole ensemble exorbitant.
- codyb 8y ago
  Hmm. Well. Let’s see. 5th best healthcare out of the fifty states according to [0]. 1st best education system [1]. 7th by median household income [2]. Wow! 45th on the infrastructure list [3]. 37th on inequality [4]. So, seems like you get what you pay for. My guess is that all those plains states have less people and less infrastructure to maintain in general, and with great opportunities also comes great inequality in some instances. I did not read a word on any of the linked articles besides rank as I’m at work. But it seems interesting, and I didn’t skip over the ones that surprised me. [0] - https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/rankings/health-care https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/rankings/health-care [1] - https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/rankings/education https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/rankings/education [2] - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_and_territories_by_income https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_and_terr... [3] - https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/rankings/infrastructure https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/rankings/infrastruct... [4] - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_Gini_coefficient https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_Gini_...
  - dsfyu404ed 8y ago
    Education in MA is nothing special. We look good on paper because we have a lot of rich people to drag the various averages and medians up. The kids of all those pharma engineers, college professors and tech workers tend to do pretty well regardless of the school system you put them through. If you compare outcomes relative to inputs (i.e. compare poor kids to poor kids and rich kids to rich kids) the range of differences between states gets a lot smaller and it's IIRC Texas and a couple other states you'd never have expected that do the best. Edit: can't find the citation but it was an article that was on HN awhile back.
- dsfyu404ed 8y ago
  >MA taxes everything across the board. But where does it go? Certainly not back to the taxpayers in the form of public services and social programs. The input to output ratio of MA government is highly inefficient yet most people in this state worship at the alter of government authority so nobody questions why it has to be so inefficient.
  - amanaplanacanal 8y ago
    You could probably look at your state budget and find out, if you are really interested.
    - dsfyu404ed 8y ago
      Looking at the state budget, or anything published by the state doesn't tell you what is just pork and what positions are jobs programs for the politically well connected. I have immediate family members in state government in MA. It's not like I don't know how this work.

All by itself sure. Other states usually go one way or another. Tax more here but a little less over there. MA taxes everything across the board. After factoring in all the other expenses you can easily stand back and call the whole ensemble exorbitant.

codyb 8y ago
Hmm. Well. Let’s see. 5th best healthcare out of the fifty states according to [0]. 1st best education system [1]. 7th by median household income [2]. Wow! 45th on the infrastructure list [3]. 37th on inequality [4]. So, seems like you get what you pay for. My guess is that all those plains states have less people and less infrastructure to maintain in general, and with great opportunities also comes great inequality in some instances. I did not read a word on any of the linked articles besides rank as I’m at work. But it seems interesting, and I didn’t skip over the ones that surprised me. [0] - https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/rankings/health-care https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/rankings/health-care [1] - https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/rankings/education https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/rankings/education [2] - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_and_territories_by_income https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_and_terr... [3] - https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/rankings/infrastructure https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/rankings/infrastruct... [4] - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_Gini_coefficient https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_Gini_...
- dsfyu404ed 8y ago
  Education in MA is nothing special. We look good on paper because we have a lot of rich people to drag the various averages and medians up. The kids of all those pharma engineers, college professors and tech workers tend to do pretty well regardless of the school system you put them through. If you compare outcomes relative to inputs (i.e. compare poor kids to poor kids and rich kids to rich kids) the range of differences between states gets a lot smaller and it's IIRC Texas and a couple other states you'd never have expected that do the best. Edit: can't find the citation but it was an article that was on HN awhile back.
dsfyu404ed 8y ago
>MA taxes everything across the board. But where does it go? Certainly not back to the taxpayers in the form of public services and social programs. The input to output ratio of MA government is highly inefficient yet most people in this state worship at the alter of government authority so nobody questions why it has to be so inefficient.
- amanaplanacanal 8y ago
  You could probably look at your state budget and find out, if you are really interested.
  - dsfyu404ed 8y ago
    Looking at the state budget, or anything published by the state doesn't tell you what is just pork and what positions are jobs programs for the politically well connected. I have immediate family members in state government in MA. It's not like I don't know how this work.