FXLAX

Getting more out of something than you put in sounds like good fiscal planning to me.

The solution to this whole debt mess is to force the federal government to only spend on the 18 things the constitution (article I section 8) says they are allowed to spend on. And then they wouldn’t be able to strap states with unfunded mandates.

But alas, doing what the constitution actually says seems to be too complicated for certain people (with a certain agenda).

Bluesideup1

I like these moronic statements that sound good without looking into how it actually breaks down. These kinda quips are truly for the uniformed that just want to try and justify a position. Never mind the fact that California is By FAR the largest recipient of welfare while the red states are the largest recipients of Military and Federal employees.

There is a bid difference in what is being spent as the Military bases and Federal building are in Red states due to the lower costs of living and land. While the vast majority of the welfare goes to back to California.

It is immaterial where the military bases and Federal buildings are located as they are part of the government spending and could be located anywhere. So while California is paying more in federal spending than they get back it is only because these facilities are not located there but they still get the same protection and federal services provided to everyone in the nation. Unlike the welfare the federal government pours into California which only provide for those people of that State.

The point being that if California stopped paying federal taxes and the U.S. stopped providing benefits to California the U.S. would be in a net positive situation.

05Duramax

California has more federal employees than any other state and the District of Columbia.

See above statement qouted.....

Bluesideup1

It takes a lot of federal workers to hand out all that welfare.

JamesNoBrakes

I don't think that's quite right. Military bases tend to be located in strategic places that allow for their mission/training to be accomplished, such as launching bombers over the pole, rapid deployment of troops, training areas, naval bases, etc.

Hossharris

Maybe once upon a time.

Now it’s all politically based

rickair7777

No. It has always been subject to pork-barrel political influence.

But most USAF, USN, and USMC bases need specific geographic locations for proximity to oceans, beaches, defensive lines of approach, or targets. No marine division will ever be located away from beaches, and they also need to be near a Navy base to train on ships. At this point Navy and USMC bases are well established and not changing in any conceivable alternative future. They already BRACed out all redundancy in major force basing... nothing left to cut without leaving gaping holes in capability and access.

The Army is more subject to political gyrations... as long as the area has a low COL, plenty of open real estate and a miserable climate you can station army units there. The army can move forces by rail to air/sea embarkation points. Expeditionary forces (SOF, airborne) will be near strategic airlift assets, and will have dedicated airfield facilities.

HQ's and classroom-training facilities can be located almost anywhere.

DarkSideMoon

There’s publicly available numbers on the amount of welfare recipients in every state. As a function of state population, California was lower than the first 3 red states I ran numbers for. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Hossharris

Yeah. BRAC was all about capabilities and redundancy. No politics there ....

(Millennial-style eyeroll)

PRS Guitars

Therefore what?