Voting with Your Feet
Related source » Census: Fast Growth in States with No Income Tax
[This related source is recommended in its entirety.]
“Census Bureau director Robert Groves announced on Tuesday the first results of the 2010 census and the reapportionment of House seats (and therefore electoral votes) among the states. […] [G]rowth tends to be stronger where taxes are lower. Seven of the nine states that do not levy an income tax grew faster than the national average. The other two, South Dakota and New Hampshire, had the fastest growth in their regions, the Midwest and New England. Altogether, 35 percent of the nation's total population growth occurred in these nine non-taxing states, which accounted for just 19 percent of total population at the beginning of the decade.”
— By Michael Barone, December 22, 2010 (aei.org)
These votes are made for booting,
and that's just what they'll do.
One of these days these votes
are gonna walk away from you.
[with apologies to Nancy Sinatra]
We need to take greater advantage of our republican union of states. Consensus or bi-partisan policy in the federal government is rare; most policy is enacted in a contentious environment, usually polarized between conflicting socio-economic visions.
But our 50-state union offers a useful testing ground for alternative policy-solutions to problems great and small. I propose we implement a strategic legislative process to increase the efficiency of enabling a more nearly perfect union for our evolving society.
To wit, for selected Congressional bills, ones that are perceived to be far-reaching with respect to the fraction of our population affected as well as overall cost to deploy the program, let there be a trial period, defined as follows. Let "P-1" be such a bill passed by Congress and signed into "provisional" law by the President. Let the term of P-1's provisional status expire with the next national census. And, let P-1 be treated as Federal law only in those states whose overall Congressional caucuses voted in favor of the bill.
Now then, after the next census, if there was a net population inflow to those states that had voted to implement P-1, this law becomes permanent and is extended as such to all 50 states. Otherwise, this provisional P-1 becomes null and void, as if it had been repealed.
Such a stepwise ratification process for far-reaching legislation will take into account the well-known economic concept, namely "voting with your feet". Any takers for such a stroll?
Post 1,552 These Votes Are Made for Booting
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