Seven State Snapshot: Are You Living in the Right State?

Do you live in a right-to-work state or a non-right-to-work state, where compulsory membership in a union can legally be a condition of employment? Is your state’s income-tax rate competitive with those of neighboring states—or the rest of the country, for that matter? Is your state adding residents or losing residents? And are you getting the best bang for your buck from the taxes you pay to your state?

Richard Rahn, senior fellow at the Cato Institute and chairman of the Institute for Global Economic Growth, writes in The Washington Times, “The United States is a federal republic, wherein the Constitution gives most governing powers to the states, not Washington. The beauty of this system is that the states can experiment to determine which policies and government structures work and which don’t.” He shows the following table ranking seven of the major states based on information from various organizations, such as the Tax Foundation and the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation (see “sources” for table).

Sources: American Legislative Exchange Council, Tax Foundation, Small Business and Entrepreneurship Council, U.S. Census Bureau, National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation.

In America you can choose the state in which you live and work. According to the census report for the last 10 years, Americans prefer to live and work in states that are open for business, like Florida, Virginia, Tennessee, and Texas. They avoid states that are unfriendly to business, like California, New Jersey, and New York, where living with the depressed results shown in the table above must be like living in another country.

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E.J. Smith - Your Survival Guy

Preparing your investments and family for when disaster strikes.

E.J. Smith is the Founder of YourSurvivalGuy.com, Managing Director at Richard C. Young & Co., Ltd., a Managing Editor of Richardcyoung.com, and Editor-in-Chief of Youngresearch.com. E.J. graduated from Babson College in Wellesley, Massachusetts, with a B.S. in finance and investments. In 1995, E.J. began his investment career at Fidelity Investments in Boston before joining Richard C. Young & Co., Ltd. in 1998. E.J. has trained at Sig Sauer Academy in Epping, NH, where he completed course-work in Practical and Defensive Handgun, Conceal Carry Pistol, Shotguns, Precision Scope Rifle and Kidnapping Prevention. E.J. plays a Yamaha Recording Custom drum set with Zilldjian cymbals. His first drum set was a 5-piece Slingerland with Zilldjians. He grew-up worshiping Neil Peart of the band Rush, and loves the song Tom Sawyer—the name of his family’s boat, a Grady-White Canyon 306. He grew up in Mattapoisett, MA, an idyllic small town on the water near Cape Cod. He spends time in Newport, RI and Bartlett, NH—both as far away from Wall Street as one could mentally get. The Newport office is on a quiet, tree lined street not far from the harbor and the log cabin in Bartlett, NH, the “Live Free or Die” state, sits on the edge of the White Mountain National Forest. He enjoys spending time in Key West and Paris. Please get in touch with E.J. at ejsmith@youngresearch.com. Sign up here to receive all the best content from Richardcyoung.com each week.