[tl]

Last time I checked, more than the majority of what I pay in taxes go to the federal government, not state or local, where it is re-distributed to other parts of the country most of whom have elected representatives from "the other party" and whose disproportionate representation changed a national election.

[rayiner]

You're overlooking sales, property, and business taxes that folks don't see directly (e.g. property taxes built into rent), which go to the state and local governments. But overall, about half of all government spending in the U.S. is at the state and local levels: https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/sites/reg_cit_glance-2018-41-e....

For many of the things people complain about (transit, housing, education, policing) 90% of funding and 99% of oversight authority happens at the state and local level. Republicans in national government have pretty much zero say over say affordable housing policy in California. Trying to pin California's failures in those areas on Republicans in Kansas is specious.

[bhupy]

First of all, you're only talking about income taxes, which as you rightly pointed out are concentrated in the Federal government. Once you factor in property and sales taxes, the distribution is roughly 50-50.

Second of all, even if you only take into account income taxes, Federal income taxes aren't re-distributed to other parts of the country in the way that you think.

The biggest line items in the Federal budget is (in decreasing order) are:

- Social Security

- Medicare + Medicaid

- Defense

Social Security isn't really "distributed" to other parts of the country, it's mostly concentrated in regions where retirees happen to live. Ditto Medicare.

You could argue that Medicaid is "distributed", however it is funded by both States and the Federal government[1].

The comment to which you are replying is correct: most public sector services like education, electricity, water, sewage, libraries, law enforcement, fire departments, etc are all funded predominately at the state and local level.

[1] https://www.kff.org/medicaid/state-indicator/federalstate-sh...