2017 Mercatus Center State Ranking on Fiscal Health

[Young Conservative]

I think this forum may have missed this, but the Mercatus Center at George Mason University released their 2017 report about each state's fiscal health last week.

The study ranks each US state’s financial health based on short- and long-term debt and other key fiscal obligations, such as unfunded pensions and healthcare benefits.
This ranking of the 50 states, reproduced from page 29 of the study, is based on their fiscal solvency in five separate categories:

Cash solvency.  Does a state have enough cash on hand to cover its short-term bills?
Budget solvency. Can a state cover its fiscal year spending with current revenues, or does it have a budget shortfall?
Long-run solvency. Can a state meet its long-term spending commitments? Will there be enough money to cushion it from economic shocks or other long-term fiscal risks?
Service-level solvency. How much “fiscal slack” does a state have to increase spending if citizens demand more services?
Trust fund solvency. How large are each state’s unfunded pension and healthcare liabilities?


5 Best States for Fiscal Health
1. Florida
2. North Dakota
3. South Dakota
4. Utah
5. Wyoming

5 Worst States for Fiscal Health
46. Maryland
47. Kentucky
48. Massachusetts
49. Illinois
50. New Jersey

Of the five states with the best fiscal health, Republicans have a complete trifecta and have for some period of time. In Florida, for example, Republicans have held the governorship and both houses of the legislature for 17 years despite it being a national 'swing state.'Of the states with the worst fiscal health, all 5 have histories of Democratic control with Kentucky being the lone 'now Atlas blue' state. Interestingly, four out  of the five worst fiscal health have recently elected liberal or moderate Republican governors and Democratic legislatures; however, based on past rankings, it is unlikely that is the reason of their poor financial status given the long term problems they face.

The Full report can be found here:
https://www.mercatus.org/statefiscalrankings

[Brittain33]

Mercatus is a libertarian think tank funded by the Kochs, and George Mason is notoriously open to this kind of activism (look up the name of their law school if you're curious.) Not saying that Illinois and NJ's finances aren't in a horrible state, but Mercatus will shape their criteria to favor small-government states even if large government states have sustainable finances.

[Young Conservative]

Mercatus is a libertarian think tank funded by the Kochs, and George Mason is notoriously open to this kind of activism (look up the name of their law school if you're curious.) Not saying that Illinois and NJ's finances aren't in a horrible state, but Mercatus will shape their criteria to favor small-government states even if large government states have sustainable finances.

That's a serious accusation, but i doubt you have a valid reason other than perceived bias. Did you read the detailed report? Until them, you cannot broadly discredit it. It clearly lists the criteria they used and it matches other data, too.

[BudgieForce]

NJ cant balance its budget, what else is new? Also, I dont get this criteria about handling a recession. NJ wasnt hit all that hard during the great recession yet Florida was amongst the worst hit.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

That service-level solvency criteria is an obvious source of bias in favor of small government, Cal. Obviously, if a state is providing less services to begin with, then with everything else equal, it will be easier to add additional services.

[Devout Centrist]

The annual hackery survey is out again!

[Gass3268]

Mercatus is a libertarian think tank funded by the Kochs, and George Mason is notoriously open to this kind of activism (look up the name of their law school if you're curious.) Not saying that Illinois and NJ's finances aren't in a horrible state, but Mercatus will shape their criteria to favor small-government states even if large government states have sustainable finances.

Yeah, Maryland and Massachusetts have pretty high taxes, but I've never heard any major complaints about either regarding their budget.

[Tintrlvr]

Mercatus is a libertarian think tank funded by the Kochs, and George Mason is notoriously open to this kind of activism (look up the name of their law school if you're curious.) Not saying that Illinois and NJ's finances aren't in a horrible state, but Mercatus will shape their criteria to favor small-government states even if large government states have sustainable finances.

That's a serious accusation, but i doubt you have a valid reason other than perceived bias. Did you read the detailed report? Until them, you cannot broadly discredit it. It clearly lists the criteria they used and it matches other data, too.

It's not a "serious accusation" in the sense that literally everyone who knows anything about think-tanks knows that the Mercatus Center is a libertarian hackery engine. They admit it themselves in their stated policy goals.

[Brittain33]

Mercatus is a libertarian think tank funded by the Kochs, and George Mason is notoriously open to this kind of activism (look up the name of their law school if you're curious.) Not saying that Illinois and NJ's finances aren't in a horrible state, but Mercatus will shape their criteria to favor small-government states even if large government states have sustainable finances.

Yeah, Maryland and Massachusetts have pretty high taxes, but I've never heard any major complaints about either regarding their budget.

I don't know if this is normal, but every year recently Massachusetts seems to have a surprise deficit in the hundreds of millions of dollars because revenues fall short of expectations. This despite having a booming economy.

[Brittain33]

Another example of how criteria favor the libertarian perspective: income taxes are much more volatile than sales taxes and will fall hard when a recession hits. It's a valid criticism that states with income taxes, and even more so progressive income taxes, will have less sustainable finances in a bust.

But the price of "sustainability" is a tax system that hits the poor and working class harder and usually keeps the government starved for resources.

I favor a combination of different taxes for stability and fairness.

[BudgieForce]

I just got an email from the Phil Murphy fundraising off this which is kind of ironic.

[Santander]

Mercatus is hackish, but they are not completely illegitimate.

[RINO Tom]

Mercatus is hackish, but they are not completely illegitimate.

[Badger]

What Britain and Ernest said Here Is Dead on. That is all.

I recognize their name from having reviewed their surveys from past years. There's absolutely nothing unexpected Dash Dash or particularly accurate in the big picture - - about these findings.

[Brittain33]

How did they rank Kansas's fiscal sustainability in recent years?

[KingSweden]

I think the Dakotas and WY being high on this ranking has more to do with being low Pop rural states with stable economies rather than anything the GOP has done

[Badger]

How did they rank Kansas's fiscal sustainability in recent years?

An excellent question I decided to check. 32nd, last in their grouping of States they ranked as average, and one above the category of below average.

But any supposedly accurate assessment of Kansas's basket case fiscal policy that ranks it on the border between average and below-average--mediocre I guess--is....

Well, enough said.

[Brittain33]

How did they rank Kansas's fiscal sustainability in recent years?

An excellent question I decided to check. 32nd, last in their grouping of States they ranked as average, and one above the category of below average.

But any supposedly accurate assessment of Kansas's basket case fiscal policy that ranks it on the border between average and below-average--mediocre I guess--is....

Well, enough said.

Yeah, anything ranking Kansas 15 slots above Massachusetts in the state of state finances is taking an odd view.

[pbrower2a]

Still... I look at bordering states that have a few things in common.

Tennessee is at #8 and Kentucky is at #47.

Ohio is at #13 and Michigan is at #36.

New Hampshire is at #25, but look at its neighbors:

Massachusetts #48 Maine #35 Vermont #40  

Technically these states are not neighbors, but close enough:
New York #39  Connecticut #37 Rhode Island #37 New Jersey #50

Virginia #15 Maryland #46

Hawaii, strictly speaking, has no neighbor, but California is probably the most similar state

Hawaii #27 California #43

Nebraska #6 Kansas #33 Oklahoma #7

Texas #23 Louisiana #44

[Ebsy]

Florida's fiscal health is pretty terrible so no surprise that this list puts it at number 1.

[Statilius the Epicurean]

All those fiscal transfers in federal spending from Atlas Red to Blue states appears to be doing its job.