When Welfare Kills

Earlier, I wrote about how people in the Netherlands and Germany were falsely blaming the Minneapolis bridge collapse on low taxes.

Classically Liberal features an interesting rebuttal refuting such allegations. First, it describes in detail how states with the highest tax rates often have the most poorly-maintained bridges.

Second, it describes how high-tax Minnesota chose to spend huge amounts of money to subsidize sports stadiums being built by billionaires, rather than on repairing roads and bridges.

My theory for why states with high taxes often have the lousiest roads and bridges was that their high taxes — like their lousy bridges — were the result of overspending on welfare, state-subsidized health care, and social services, at the expense of both taxpayers and transportation funding.

As Minnesota’s experience suggests, corporate welfare for sports stadiums can also consume vast amounts of state funds that might otherwise be available to fix roads and bridges.