State | Unemployment Rate | Total Tax Rate Rank |
North Dakota | 4.3 | 49 |
South Dakota | 4.9 | 50 |
Nebraska | 5 | 39 |
Utah | 6 | 35 |
Virginia | 6.5 | 12 |
Montana | 6.6 | 46 |
Wyoming | 6.6 | 48 |
Iowa | 6.8 | 31 |
Oklahoma | 6.8 | 28 |
Vermont | 6.8 | 44 |
New Hampshire | 6.9 | 45 |
Let’s be clear – there is more to a good economy than low taxes. What good are low taxes if your state borrows and spends like a drunken sailor? What good are low taxes if you can’t afford a responsible and honest police force.
This post isn’t an end all argument that taxes are bad, they aren’t. However, it should be noted that if Virginia didn’t have the HUGE federal stimulus, paid for by us, plus a giant printing press in the Federal Reserve, there wouldn’t have been a single state below the 7% unemployment rate with a ranking below 28. Draw your own conclusions, but mine are pretty clear – governments that provide protection, a good court system and allow us to be as free as possible (that includes with our labor and income) – are better off for it.
There is one other thing most of those states have in common, but you are not really allowed to point it out in modern day America.
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