Federal spending, state by state
The Pew Charitable trusts recently released new data up through 2013 on federal spending in the states. If we look at federal spending as a proportion of each state's overall GDP, we find that the recipients are not exactly evenly distributed: Source: Pew Charitable Trusts (based on data from 2004–2013) This is all federal spending, so these totals are a combination of military spending, social welfare programs such as Medicare, and ordinary civilian federal spending, including civilian research facilities and other programs funded by federal grants. These are proportional numbers, so they are a function of both the amount of federal spending as well as the overall size of GDP. So, in California, for example, which receives immense amounts of government spending, is nevertheless a state where federal spending is offset by a very large private sector. In a more rural state with few major private industries, such as New Mexico, the state shows up as being highly reliant...