So, among the many jokes making the rounds regarding last week's election (it's usually phrased as a joke), is that the blue states of the nation ought to find some way to secede (perhaps joining up with Canada to create something fun like this). Fun to kick around and laugh about, until someone on the right goes and takes the idea a little too seriously. The author of the alluded to article (brought to our attention by Talking Points Memo), attempts to present his statement as satire, but a quick read through seems to indicate he wouldn't mind if it became truth. Obviously, it's just bluster, anyway, with no shot at becoming reality, but it gives me an opportunity to ride an old hobby horse: that the red states would be screwed without the blue states.

I love talking about this with conservatives, because they're ever so quick to talk about the rotten coasts, no-good liberals trying to suck on the national teat, draining America of its lifeblood, and so on. It's then that I pull out my charts (which, you know, I carry around with me).

For the purpose of this back-of-the-envelope analysis, I've split the country two ways: the stupid sort, which is used by the conservative author in question, and which forces out independent minded New Hampshire while hanging on to uber-lefties Hawaii and Washington, and the red/blue sort, which breaks the states up by their electoral predisposition. I think the point would be even clearer if I could do this by county, but hey, some of us have to work.

Take a look at comparisons of state Gross State Product, Per Capita Income, and Federal Funding per Tax Dollar Collected. In the red/blue sort, eliminating 19 of the 50 states deprives middle America of over half of American output. Meanwhile, the twenty poorest states in the Union would stay in the Union given a stupid sort, and over half of the red states in both sorts are below the national average for per capita income, compared to fewer than five for the blue states. But the kicker is in tax contributions/receipts. States which give the federal government more money than they receive are overwhelmingly more likely to vote for the Democrat, and those sucking on the national teat are overwhelmingly likely to vote Republican. So welcome to the real America (minus the blue states), an economic weakling, poorer than many of those dastardly EU nations, with a huge tax gap to fill on those measly incomes. So kick us out. We'll be able to reduce taxes and provide more and better services for our better employed, richer residents.