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If Texans want to fund a military parade for $45 million, and spend $16 billion on an armed secret police force, they are welcome to do so, but then Californians should not have to fund that (and neither do the rest of us who do not agree with such things while producing an outsized portion of the federal government's income).
The issue is not which of these are federally funded vs state funded, unless of course the federal income tax for Californians is specifically reduced in turn. It's a zero sum game: as a Californian, your tax dollars (whether state or federal) are now going to more objectively horrible things and few fewer objectively good things. That's the problem.
That doesn't make it illogical, to make it illogical you'd have to do something like identify a fallacy. The same logic does apply to most of the things the US Federal government spends money on; the US baby boomers built a really stupid system that has destroyed a lot of potential for prosperity. In the US, anyway, China has been having a great time.
> If Texans want ...
I don't know where you're going with that paragraph, so I suppose I'll just agree with it. Doesn't sound entirely reasonable to me (US States aren't supposed to maintain things that look like armies and the idea might fall foul of that; but it also might not).
> ... It's a zero sum game: as a Californian, your tax dollars (whether state or federal) are now going to more objectively horrible things ...
The ideal would be Trump cuts spending, cuts taxes and then the Californians take their taxes and spend it on science funding.
I doubt that is going to happen, but the problem here is the taxes and the stuff Congress is going to be funding instead. Complain about that. If it was just a case of cut spending-cut-taxes then there is nothing stopping US citizens funding science to the same tune with the same money in a way that is more responsive to the details of what is going on. It was always a bad idea to route it through the Federal government, they don't have the bandwidth to debate this sort of issue when the world is looking like it might descend into a large multi-front conflict that could end up worse than WWII and there are riots and military deployments inside the US. It isn't important enough to deserve Congressional attention.
But I feel that is a bit light for a comment so I'll go further - producing food is a benefit to everyone and that isn't funded under the largest possible umbrella. It is funded under a highly decentralised system and works unbelievably efficiently.
There is no reason to think science is different. Even the big projects that need a lot of money (eg, a big Fusion project like ITER) have shown to be fund-able by a disparate group of entities (ironically governments). There doesn't need to be a coordinating central government giving marching orders to make it happen. Interested parties can just fund science directly.
I don't seen any evidence. Would you say that government investment in space, the internet, or medicine does not benefit the general public?
> producing food is a benefit to everyone and that isn't funded under the largest possible umbrella. It is funded under a highly decentralised system and works unbelievably efficiently.
Among other mechanisms, the federal government provides extensive financial support and incentives to food growers. Are you saying that federal food subsidies should be eliminated under the same principle as eliminating research?
> have shown to be fund-able by a disparate group of entities (ironically governments).
I feel like you are undermining your own point here.
> Interested parties can just fund science directly.
They can, but historically, profit-motivated non-governmental entities are sufficiently risk-averse that they are unwilling or unable to invest in basic research, i.e. such research that may or may not have a monetizable application. The internet is the classic example of this class of research.
> Are you saying that federal food subsidies should be eliminated under the same principle as eliminating research?
That sounds like a good idea to me. Probably, yes.
That's rather difficult when the federal government takes their tax money, and then:
1. Best-case: Spends it on their cronies and the states that elected it - while gleefully witholding disaster aid from Cali.
2. Worst-case: Spends it on great-leader-army-parades and illegally kidnapping people and deploying the military against California.
Let me turn it around - if flyover country is convinced that immigrants are ruining their glorious utopia, and is willing to destroy fundamental American rights and values to throw them all out - why the hell is it sending it's thugs into blue states? Their 'help' isn't wanted, especially when we get to foot the bill for the shakedown.
I genuinely am not joking, if the govt wants to go this direction then let’s welcome states rights to keep their money within their borders.
The bigger problem is that damn near every state bureaucracy has forgotten how to actually write and evaluate their own damn rules for all sorts of expenditures that are currently spec'd out on a "follow fed guidelines so we can apply for grants" basis.
This doesn’t imply that the net flows average out to zero.
It'd be a giant nothingburger for the most part.
And the swing between states depending on how it's measured can be QUITE large.
As someone from a state that puts in a hell of a lot more than it gets out. I'd be glad for you to reduce my tax load, and let my state improve its services all at once! I can't speak of how happy I'd be.
Even if it is 10-20%, that's nice phat cut. Which isn't far off in the more extreme cases.
Those losing states still get to reap all sorts of savings by not doing things that are done at the behest of the feds. Like for example California has dragged its dick all over every policy involving indoor water and plumbing and outdoor rainwater and runoff management in just about the worst ways. Pretty much every state east of the Mississippi could stain to instantly gain more bang for their buck in every expenditure of that nature by simply creating their own (perhaps in cooperation with nearby states) sensible rules on the subject. It's just pants on head retarded that we've got desert states and wet states using the same rule book in this area. Repeat for all sorts of other subject where the sensible policy scoping level is something other than "the entire nation".