To determine the states with the best taxpayer ROI, WalletHub contrasted state and local tax collections with the quality of the services residents receive in each of the 50 states. Our data set includes a total of 29 key metrics.
Top 10:
Bottom 10:
41) Massachusetts
New Jersey
Vermont
Arkansas
Delaware
North Dakota
New York
New Mexico
Hawaii
50) California
DB2
Wild to see SD and ND at the opposite ends of the spectrum when the two states are not that significantly dissimilar.
I think the government services ranking are not that different overall, but per capita taxes in North Dakota are 45% higher than in South Dakota. Doing more with less in SD ==> higher ROI.
DB2
They are actually over 100% higher (you may have not switched the year from 1980 to 2021) - with nearly all of the difference coming just from fees on “Severance” - taxes on the removal of natural resources. $2100 per capita vs $10 per capita.
Very interesting. Certainly makes one wonder as to what they do with those Severance fees that is inefficient.
North Dakota has oil fields and their Revenue per person is much higher.
Per capita taxes are higher because Revenue per capita is higher
Your assumptions need to be looked at closer.
His motto, “Half the news is more useful than getting it right”.
I think the biggest issue with this analysis is that it only looks at revenue generated from state and local taxes, but the “quality of services” issues include spending from local, state, AND federal sources. In other words, it’s an apples and oranges comparison.
As has been pointed out numerous times on this board, red states generally get more federal tax money back than they pay in and blue states generally get back fewer dollars than they pay in. So in general, red states are getting money from blue states to help prop up their “quality of services.” Wealthier states are funding “quality of services” spending in poorer states, so of course their ROI is better.
Your welcome.
Sorry about that I don’t know where that US, Germany plot came in. Here is what I meant to post.
Yes, but that does not appear to lead to better government services overall. Hence the higher ROI in South Dakota.
DB2
Much depends on how one measures ROI and whether the metrics used really measure quality of life. One metric that I don’t believe was used in the study but may be the most important ROI measurement of all is Life Expectancy.
Here are states with highest Life Expectancy at birth: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/pressroom/sosmap/life_expectancy/life_expectancy.htm
Top 10:
| State | Expectancy |
|---|---|
| HI | 80.7 |
| WA | 79.2 |
| MN | 79.1 |
| CA | 79 |
| MA | 79 |
| NH | 79 |
| OR | 78.8 |
| VT | 78.8 |
| UT | 78.6 |
| CT | 78.4 |
Hawaii, Massachusetts, Vermont, and California have among the worst taxpayer ROIs yet those born in those states live longer than rest of the nation with much better taxpayer ROIs. They must be doing something right.
Yea but if your miserable why would you want to live longer. That is where Bob has it right. You win if you die with the most money…right?
Andy
Based on previous experience, WalletHub never met an income tax they thought worthwhile. This is consistent with that.
If you peruse their weighting system, they have made arbitrary choices in what is important and what is not. It’s the very randomness of their weighting that makes the whole thing suspect. And there’s also the idea that there is little logic to their, uh, logic.
North Dakota and South Dakota have different economies; South Dakota has significant tourism and there’s basically nothing to see in the northern state. Tourism is a good industry, it’s fairly clean, you get to gouge out-of-staters, and they don’t require services.
That’s just one example. The comparison between Vermont and New Hampshire is another. Similar in size and ethnic make-up, weather and infrastructure issues, but New Hampshire has tons of Massachusetts employees to live there to escape the Massachusetts income taxes while enjoying the fruits of those very same taxes: better higher education, more industry, and so on. Vermont doesn’t get that, so their profiles are different.
No, this is one of those click-bait things that WalletHub is good at, which manages to push their agenda, and which, while somewhat interesting, is just a concoction of randomoids, truly without deeper meaning.