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November 06, 2004
Red States in the Red: Post Election
We didn't see it coming, so now everybody is looking. If there is a shred of anything to enjoy after this election, it's all the political maps. The closest to getting the real picture is this one.
The "red states take and blue states give" issue has been popping back up, so I gave this graphic a refresh with the final election results.
The trend is even more striking. I don't think it means what it implies. It implies that the red states are greedy freeloaders, or that the red states enjoy the favor of a biased federal government. I'm not cynical enough to think this is the real story.
This is just two trends that both depend on population density. People who live in dense, diverse populations have more exposure to people-who-are-not-like-me. For this reason they don't support wars that hurt and kill people-who-are-not-like-me, or laws that restrict the rights of people-who-are-not-like-me.
The other trend is the efficiency of spending government money. It's just cheaper to serve people who live close to each other. Hawaii is an exception to this trend, and it debunks the red-states-greedy-blue-states-generous idea. It's just more expensive to send services half way around the world.
Posted by dme at November 6, 2004 05:36 PM
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