Southerners more charitable?

[Filuwaúrdjan]

It should also be pointed out that people with lower incomes tend (just about everywhere) to give a higher % of their income to charities than people with higher incomes. The top ten states are:

1. MS
2. AR
3. SD
4. OK
5. TN
6. AL
7. LA
8. UT
9. SC
10. WV

Spot a trend? With the exception of Utah (and we all know why Utah is so high) these are low income states.
I should probably point out that church attendence in New England is actually pretty high for the most part.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Let's see here's those states rankings in getting money from the feds.

MS $1.83 (3)
AR $1.47 (13)
SD $1.49 (11)
OK $1.48 (12)
TN $1.29 (20
AL $1.69 (6)
LA $1.47 (14)
UT $1.19 (22)
SC $1.36 (15)
WV $1.82 (4)
http://www.taxfoundation.org/research/show/266.html

Notice a pattern? Not one of those states got back less than $1.19 for every dollar they sent to the feds.

So? These are (as pointed out before) poor states (with one exception. And that exception has a serious poverty problem in places). What's the problem with a bit of redistribution now and again?

[Filuwaúrdjan]

You fail to take into account cost of living.

No matter how you measure it Central Appalachia or the Mississippi Delta are a hell of a lot poorer than the San Francisco Bay Area. I don't really see the problem with taking money from rich areas to spend on poor areas. But then again, I'm not a hypocrite.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

So? The party in the Majority gets to spend more money on it's incumbents than the party in the Minority. And?

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Have I? Don't think so.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

The federal government fails to take into account cost of living.

And, with a few exceptions, they shouldn't. There is no need to; even in a rich city like San Francisco there are still areas with very low incomes and poverty problems.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

So? House prices have NOTHING to do with poverty whatsover. The very fact that house prices in your area are topping $1 million on regular basis indicates pretty damn strongly that it is NOT a poor area; sure like everything in your part of the world the value is certain inflated, but not so much as to obscure a very obvious point that you are blinded by your own selfishness from seeing.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

No, and I never said that it does. I would certainly say that enough does to more than justify it though.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

I didn't say that there was anything right or wrong with it. The majority party gets to spend more money than the minority party. The Democrats did it when they ran things. That's life.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

No I do not as it does not really effect poor people very much, unless the cost of basic things like food is stupidly high. Even so, it would make more sense for the state governments to deal with that particular problem.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Poor people in San Francisco, Boston and Manhatten do not subsidise rich people in West Virginia, Mississippi and North Dakota, unless the amount of money spent on this sort of redistribution makes up almost all of the federal budget. And it doesn't.
What, in effect, happens with this sort of thing is that money from rich people in the San Francisco Bay area and other rich places, goes to poor areas like Appalachia or the Mississippi Delta. Could you explain what is so very wrong about that?

[Filuwaúrdjan]

But it costs more for them to live,

Are you actually going to make an effort to respond to my points or... ?

You must be logged in to read this quote.

I've told you this before... but you don't seem to have listend... it's generally not a good idea to get drunk before posting.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Where did I say anything like that? Homelessness usually has a hell of a lot more to do with an inadequate provision of social housing than absurdly high house prices.

The median gross rent in San Francisco as of the last census was $928. 63.2% of renters were paying more than $750. This compares with the Californian averages of $747 and 48.1% and the national averages of $602 and 28.8%.

Now, I could be wrong, but I have a funny feeling that those figures have a much greater effect on the number of homeless than average house prices.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

That's rich coming from you

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Not true. Just not true at all; the pattern of relief to the poor and poor areas in America is certainly very strange (a product of the way government is set up for the most part) with some impressive services on the one hand, and some dire failings (notably over healthcare; although the people that get *really* screwed by the crazy healthcare setup aren't actually people at the very bottom) on the other, but it's just not true to say that the poor don't get [expletive deleted].
Besides, most Americans are quite compassionate towards people less fortunate than themselves and there is a lot of support for effective anti-poverty measures (something that both Republicans and [national] Democrats are opposed to for some odd reason), notably among most Evangelicals (yes! I've managed to get this row slightly back on topic!).

You must be logged in to read this quote.

But they probably *would* if they regained power. Besides, the Democrats have always had a couple of people who have been very skilled at getting lots of money for their districts (Carl Perkins and Daniel Flood come to mind). Not that that's always a bad thing.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

And has anything been done about that by the state (when you lot were in charge that this. No need for a rant about Der Governator at the moment) or local governments?

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Not true at all: http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/poverty/povdef.html

Besides, there really aren't many rich people in West Virginia. The only concentrations are in the Eastern Panhandle (D.C exurbia) and some of the western Charleston suburbs. There are a couple of tiny concentrations in other places (just east of Morgantown for example) but those areas wouldn't be considered to be rich in most other places.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

You really need to lay off the booze

[Filuwaúrdjan]

We've been over this topic before.  The conclusion reached at that time is that Southerners, on average, go to church more than those in, say, New England, and given that every single time you go to church, it's suggested that you donate some money, it makes sense that churchgoers would be more charitable than non-churchgoers.

A better thing to measure, in my opinion, that would really measure the level of charitability, would be the rate of completely voluntary, non-prompted donations, such as donations to the Red Cross or something like that.

Of course, there are also other arguments given by the Boston Foundation for why this measure is not a good one that you seem to have ignored.

Honestly Gabu, I'm not at all sure that there is a significantly lower level of church attendance in northern than in southern states.  I think this aspect of the so-called blue-red divide has been seriously exaggerated.

Attendence (sort of) by county: http://www.valpo.edu/geomet/pics/geo200/religion/adherents.gif

Look how high southern New England is