With the tax deadline drawing near, the personal-finance website WalletHub followed up on its 2019 Tax Rates by State report with an in-depth analysis of 2019’s Most & Least Federally Dependent States as well as accompanying videos to determine how much those with the lowest tax rates lean on Uncle Sam compared with those paying the highest.
In order to identify which states most and least depend on federal support, WalletHub compared the 50 states across three key metrics: return on taxes paid to the federal government; federal funding as a share of state revenue; and share of federal jobs.
| Most Federally Dependent States | Least Federally Dependent States | |||
| 1 | New Mexico | 41 | Connecticut | |
| 2 | Mississippi | 42 | Nebraska | |
| 3 | Kentucky | 43 | Virginia | |
| 4 | West Virginia | 44 | Massachusetts | |
| 5 | Alabama | 45 | Minnesota | |
| 6 | Arizona | 46 | Illinois | |
| 7 | Alaska | 47 | Utah | |
| 8 | Montana | 48 | New Jersey | |
| 9 | South Carolina | 49 | Delaware | |
| 10 | Indiana | 50 | Kansas | |
Key Stats
- With an average dependency rank of 20.55, Red States are altogether more reliant on federal funding than Blue States, which rank 33.25 on average. (The lower the rank, the more dependent the state.)
- There is a 57.7 percent correlation between a state’s federal dependency and its per-capita GDP. That means the least wealthy states tend to receive the most federal support.
- Illinois is the fifth least federally dependent state, which helps explain the fact that it has the highest tax rates in the nation. On the flip side, Alaska is the seventh most federally dependent state and has the lowest tax rates.
To view the full report and your state’s rank, please visit:
https://wallethub.com/edu/
