Somehow, I am totally unsurprised that the OP “made his money” in multi-level marketing.
Convenient that most of the red states have “no data available”. Perhaps they’re just too depressed to report.
I agree. If you have a better source, please send it.
If you have another source, again, I’m all ears.
It just ‘seems right’ to me that the most conservative states (populace and legislature) would be the best run, fiscally. But that’s the centrist view. Maybe a liberal would see things differently.
If so, please feel free to post another source about it. All I have is anecdotes: NY in awful shape, California in worse shape, both states very liberal and run by Democrats for years.
In what possible sense is that the centrist view?:dubious:
Better yet, if your source is full of holes, don’t use it.
I’m just asking you to qualify a statement you made, I’m not asking you anything complicated.
Nobody is advocating indefinite deficit spending. Just one short decade ago America had a budget surplus. Going into the meltdown Ireland and Spain had a budget surplus. It would appear that countries with welfare states can indeed pay for them, it’s just the unregulated private sector that has brought about the current massive budget deficits and the need for governments to continue deficit spending.
Why should it? I’ve repeatedly presented data here that shows at the federal level, when Democrats are in the White House, the country does better on just about any fiscal/economic measure you can think of.
We’ve even done red states versus blue states as net contributors or teat-suckers for federal money, and the red states are clearly teat-suckers.
All that’s old news, and completely goes against your “just seems right” expectations.
In the sense that it “seems right” to Mr Smashy; but in what sense of “right” is not entirely clear. 
Here’s another interesting source: GDP per capita by state. If you look you’ll see mostly blue states at the top and red states dominating the bottom. Apparently this means that Red-staters are lazy sloths. (My point? That you can come up with all sorts of positive and negative stats broken up by state and that any comparisons are meaningless.)
Not Republicans in office, surely. Public works would imply raising taxes to pay all those government salaries.
As far as the efficiency of private charities contrasted to government welfare spending, I think ironically private charities may be worse for the reasons we expect them to be better. They lack the structural incentives for oversight that government agencies do.
Private institutions lack the ability to coerce funds, it is true. But government agencies aren’t just coercing funds at will either. The government does a lot of stuff beyond charity, & charity is not seen as directly benefiting the government as organization; it can be hard to get funds into charitable programs. Private charities rely on those who donate, feel good for having done so, & don’t check where the money goes. Government agencies have to beg for their piece of the pile of extorted tax dollars from politicians, some of whom would rather spend the money on security apparatus to protect their station, & many of whom will hold the agency’s feet to the fire for fear that they’re wasting tax monies. Private charities can waste enormous amounts.
Of course, there’s a lot of variety in actual practice. But at least we can agree with this guy:
[QUOTE=Austin Cline, “Austin’s Atheism Blog”]
http://atheism.about.com/b/2004/04/13/efficiency-of-private-charities.htm
Can private organizations be more efficient than the government? At times - and usually because private organizations don’t have to follow all of the rules designed to ensure that government organizations are answerable to the public and as fair as possible. Even then, however, they aren’t necessarily better or more efficient. We can see plenty of waste, mismanagement, and other skulduggery in private companies all of the time. Organizations are as good as the people who run them - private or public.
[/QUOTE]
Just because statistics are like prisoners doesn’t mean “any comparisons are meaningless.”
What a complete load of bullshit. Do you continually spend more than you make? How can a government do this continually? The answer is it can’t be done. The results are clearly seen in the newspaper. The UK is eliminating hundreds of thousands of jobs. They CAN’T AFFORD to pay for them. Social security programs are unfunded in many countries. They CAN’T AFFORD the packages voted into practice. They are nothing but government ponzi schemes. It’s 2nd grade math that seems to allude every politician on the planet.
What in the name of all that is Holy does this mean?
Really? You think 2nd-graders get macroeconomics?
There’s plenty to learn in those comments. F’rinstance, I learned that I am required by law to get a yearly physical. I will assume that the rest of the facts supporting the inadequate US health care system arise from the same well of stupidity as that little factoid.
Ummmm…exactly. Way to miss the point.
I haven’t missed a goddamn thing. This has been brewing for years and it was upfront and obvious.
The point is that some – but not all – conservatives do not mind or even warmly support the fatal combination of increased spending and low taxes not despite – but because – of the fact that it will eventually lead to a debt crisis.
So pointing out that govenment expenditures cannot exceed revenues is correct but does not add to the conversation. The theory of “starving the beast” entails supporting exactly that.
No need to go that high up, he meant to say “elude”.
Oh. That kind of makes sense now. Still incorrect, but at least understandable when, you know, the actual correct words are used.