Census Bureau: Majority of Affluent Counties In Northeast US 285
An anonymous reader writes "I'm not a big fan of heat maps, but the US Census Bureau has just released a set of maps that succinctly capture average income distribution across the US. BusinessInsider points out that well over half of the most affluent counties in the US are concentrated in the Northeast (counting Virginia, presumably for the suburbs of Washington, D.C. located in that southern state). Of course, the cost of living is higher in those counties as well. Meanwhile, poor counties tend to be clustered in the southeast and in southwestern states on the Mexican border. There is good news for the northern prarie states, though, particularly North and South Dakota, as they lead in the number of counties with gains in household income over the past five years."
Speaking as a non-American (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:red v blue (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:red v blue (Score:5, Insightful)
If you really believe what you just wrote (that the "right" actually proposes reducing government and that less government opens greater opportunities for the poor), then your comment explains the situation perfectly, but not in the way you intended.
Re:red v blue (Score:5, Insightful)
Bullshit the "right" wants to reduce power.
The "right" only say they want to reduce prower, but in reality want to expand it as much as the "Left"
Take the TSA, Dept of Homeland Security, etc. Or if you want something more recent the "right" republican author of the patriot is pissed the law is being used the way it is. He thinks it is gross over step and proposed a law to change it. His solution? Spend tens of millions of dollars annually on high priced lawyers with top secret clearances to act as a legal advocate for the people so it wouldn't just be the NSA and the judge in FISA court room.
If you actually believe in the bullshit about power reduction then you are a fucking idiot. Because not one of their laws actually will reduce government power. They just want to push that power to the corporations. The "spending" cuts basically only take away services that the poor use. while taxing them for the privilege of being able to use the remaining. If the "Right" really wanted smaller government the the DHS, TSA, and DOD each need to be cut in half. Cut those down and i will agree to cut equal cuts elsewhere.
But no one on the "right" will ever actually make the government smaller just shuffle it around so their Rich friends gets all the benefits.
Re:red v blue (Score:5, Insightful)
Common sense and hard data both point to strong social safety nets improving opportunity, and increasing entrepreneurship and the number of small businesses [reuters.com]. There are two main reasons for this:
1. The safety net makes it much more possible to take the chance of starting your own business. Failure means you may lose your investment capital, but your family won't starve, won't lose their healthcare, won't lose their retirement, and won't lose access to a thorough education.
2. The safety net levels the "benefits" playing field between small business and large corporations. Not only does the US's system of employer-based healthcare make it more difficult and risky for those who try to start a small business, but it gives large, established companies an advantage because they have the size and weight to push for better deals.
The ONLY people whose economic opportunities are strengthened by the lack of a social safety net are the people who are already on top, who already own large companies and already make loads of money. They don't want competition from employees who can easily quit and start their own company. But even the rich would probably benefit in the long run, because pushing your customer base into abject poverty is not a way to increase sales (IMO right now they're coasting along on their ability to make goods dirty cheap by using third-world labor).
Re:red v blue (Score:4, Insightful)
If you are looking for empirical evidence, maybe instead of looking at the wish lists of Presidents, you might want to look at what was actually implemented by the congress at the same time.
Urban versus rural [Re:red v blue] (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm not from the US, so I never understood why poor people vote conservative?
Liberals don't understand this either, so your lack of understanding doesn't stem from not being from the US.
Liberalism is, overall, the urban and suburban political philosophy; conservatism is typically the rural political philosophy. Rural counties are poorer than urban ones, resulting in the political split you see.
Liberalism is not really marketed to people outside of the urban centers. Most liberals don't seem to have much interest in what people in those areas think, other than making quips like that one: "We have a very very very stupid population". (The people in rural areas think exactly the same thing.)
Re:red v blue (Score:2, Insightful)
Ok, if your post is true then nobody would be a conservative. Many people, including intelligent ones (and most doctorate level people outside of academia) are conservative. QED you didn't answer the question but instead substituted your own rationale for being liberal, which is somewhat irrelevant.
Southerners traditionally favor autonomy and distrust the government for various historic reasons. Those who rise out of poverty often overly value initiative and hard work, and would rather keep more of their earnings than to support those without it. Finally, from my experience in living in ground zero for poverty, welfare doesn't do much except make you dependant on the government. My home county has lost essentially all non-government jobs due to the free money, so people live a humiliating and destitute existance on $710 per month.
Re: red v blue (Score:5, Insightful)
> As opposed to Democrats who proceed to make Christian values illegal?
Democrats do nothing of the kind.
What you are talking about are the mindless hysterics of the theocrat fringe that define oppression as the inability to impose their views on the rest of us. These are people with benign sounding names like "Famiy Research Council".
The GOP needs to stop pandering to and aligning themselves with these American Talibans.
Re:Urban versus rural [Re:red v blue] (Score:2, Insightful)
Amusing to know that most people in the Urban centers would starve to death of not for the Rual areas.
No, they wouldn't. If the Rural areas didn't exist, the people in those Urban Centers would then need to be producing their own food. Since the rural areas do exist, though, there is food importation. Paid for with money from the economic activities Urban areas do have.
Which is what they export.
Of course, if New York was wiped off the face of the planet, people would have to do without....um...what?
Well, New York is the 16th largest economy in the world, behind South Korea, so the state probably produces a lot of things you don't realize you buy. Lots of cabbage, apples, cherries, as well as dairy products and honey.
Or did you mean New York City? Well, besides the obvious Stock exchange, there's plenty of research in the fields of information technology and healthcare, but also manufacturing. Garments, food products (there's a reason why that Picante sauce commercial referenced another brand being made in New York City, that's where a ton of factories are). New York City is also a major center of film and television production. Not to mention book publishing and journalism.
Of course, you, in your snobby rural superiority kick, may not value such things, you may decide to dismiss all of this as unimportant and unnecessary, all the while deriding urbanites for their arrogance, as they aren't the plain and simple folk of the rural areas who do what's important.
Re:red v blue (Score:5, Insightful)
Talk about hypocracy, you got flaming liberals that are all for killing unborn humans but are aghast that we would kill someone for something like , i dont know shooting up a school.
Liberals are not "for" killing unborn humans. They are for someone other than politicians making the decision. I see no hypocrisy in being both pro-choice and anti-death-penalty: In both cases, I am opposed to government officials having life and death power over the citizenry.
Re: red v blue (Score:4, Insightful)
They aren't forced to pay for birth control - they are forced to pay for insurance, which, among other things, provides for birth control.
Indirectly paying for something that you don't like is not at all new, and all of us have been in that situation. For example, I don't like the US foreign policy in the Middle East, but my income taxes still fund it.