Proof Conservatives Donate More Than Liberals Do
One of my children, who is of the liberal persuasion, implied recently that liberals were, well, just nicer people than conservatives. This goes back to the old "fish" argument - that it is better, and more compassionate, to teach a man to fish than to give him a fish. If you give him a fish you feed him once, but then he waits to be given another fish. If you teach him to fish, you feed him forever. The founding fathers of this country were well-versed in history and on the nature of man when they organized our form of government to encourage the pursuit of profit - with private property, enforcement of contracts and limited government providing the setting. Their inventions have led to the greatest prosperity and freedom ordinary working people have ever known throughout all history.
But a little research I have done shows a much more pertinent difference between liberals and conservatives on the matter of niceness and compassion. We conservatives have often considered that liberals show their "compassion" by giving away what other people earn - in the form of taxes collected and redistributed in the form of various welfare programs. Now I can prove that it actually goes much deeper than that. Liberals tend to be much more stingy in contributing their own money to charities than are conservatives.
If you look at the per capita income ranking and compare it to the per capita giving ranking, on a state by state basis, you find that the top 25 contributors were states that all voted for Bush (R) in the last election, while the bottom 9 in contributions (and 19 of the bottom 25) voted for Kerry (D).
From left to right the first number is per capita income, the second number is per capita giving, the third number compares the two, and the fourth is the comparative-giving ranking. Unfortunately my website does not permit tables or tab-spacing, so I can't line up the numbers neatly for you.
If you took any statistics courses, you will realize that these statistics are overwhelmingly revealing. It's clear that the propensity of liberals to "do what feels good", regardless of the facts, does not extend to charity.
R Mississippi______ 50 6 44 1
R Arkansas________ 46 5 41 2
R South Dakota____ 44 9 35 3
R Oklahoma_______ 42 8 34 4
R Tennessee______ 35 3 32 5
R Alabama________ 38 7 31 6
R Louisiana_______ 43 12 31 7
R Utah___________ 30 2 28 8
R South Carolina___ 39 13 26 9
R West Virginia____ 48 22 26 10
R Idaho__________ 41 20 21 11
R Texas__________ 22 4 18 12
R Nebraska_______ 34 17 17 13
R North Dakota____ 45 29 16 14
R Wyoming_______ 17 1 16 15
R North Carolina___ 28 16 12 16
R Kansas_________ 27 15 12 17
R Florida_________ 23 14 9 18
R Georgia_________18 11 7 19
R Missouri________ 31 24 7 20
R Kentucky_______ 40 33 7 21
R New Mexico_____ 47 40 7 22
R Montana________ 49 45 4 23
R Indiana_________ 29 31 -2 24
R Alaska__________ 25 28 -3 25
D New York________ 5 10 -5 26
R Iowa___________ 36 42 -6 27
R Nevada_________ 13 21 -8 28
R Ohio___________ 32 44 -12 29
D Maine__________ 37 49 -12 30
D California________ 6 19 -13 31
D Maryland________ 4 18 -14 32
D Washington______ 11 25 -14 33
D Vermont________ 33 47 -14 34
D Oregon_________ 26 41 -15 35
D Pennsylvania_____ 19 34 -15 36
R Virginia__________ 7 23 -16 37
R Arizona__________ 21 37 -16 38
D Delaware_________ 14 30 -16 39
D Illinois___________ 9 26 -17 40
D Michigan_________ 16 35 -19 41
D Hawaii___________ 24 43 -19 42
R Colorado__________ 10 32 -22 43
D Minnesota_________ 12 36 -24 44
D Connecticut_________ 1 27 -26 45
D Wisconsin__________ 20 46 -26 46
D Rhode Island________ 15 50 -35 47
D New Jersey__________ 2 38 -36 48
D Massachusetts________ 3 39 -36 49
D New Hampshire_______ 8 48 -40 50
Source: Catalogueforphilanthropy.com
posted by RussWilcox @ 6:18 AM
4 comments
4 Comments:
The Fox News Network did a study on which president gave the most in poverty entitlements, and found out President Bush gave more to the poor, than any president going all the way back to the Johnson administration. Of course, Charley Rangles prefered not to believe this, when Bill O. showed him the stats one night on the Factor. What a phony he is! How can this fool sit there with his bare face hanging out, and lie to the viewers? He still insisted that George Bush doesn't like black people. Bush has more blacks in his cabinet than,"our first black President", Bubba Clinton had. Earth to Charlie!!!
The extension of the results of this study to the demographic of so-called "liberals" vs. so called "conservatives" is highly suspect. First of all, the results of the study are from the tax returns of 2002, and you are correlating them with the elction of 2004. So your data sets are mismatched by two years. Second of all, there is no adjustment or consideration for state taxes and the amount residents of states are already giving in the form of "liberal" social programs in those states (education, child care, etc.) Thirdly, there is absolutely no breakdown as to what those people are giving to - it's simply what they claimed as a charitable donation on their taxes two years ago. Fourthly, There is not necessarily a direct correlation established between red vs. blue in terms of presidential preference vs. the overall state leanings politically or on individual issues. In fact, if you look at the red/blue (a flawed graphic anyways, due to the antiquated subtleties of the electoral system) county by county, you will see a very different map, with people of both persuasions well distributed within states of both leanings.
This method of continually attempting to pit two sides (so-called liberals and conservatives) against one another is fundamentally flawed and only serves to divide people. Where are the positive suggestions, solutions, ways to bring people together cooperatively?
Every one is looking for the same things and all of this political antagonism doesn't help anyone achieve them. Everyone wants to be happy, want their family to be safe, and wants to get along with one another. Continually seeing the world in terms of US vs. THEM will never lead to peace, happiness and stability. It will only breed more conflict and dissatisfaction.
The ability of a liberal to nitpick trivia while ignoring the elephant
in the room is awesome. This person completely misses that the point of
this article is to refute the statement that liberals are nicer people
than conservatives - which in itself is pretty divisive."
to anonymous -
Statement of the facts surrounding the premise of the article in question - you label as "nitpicking". You present no factual contribution to the discussion - seemingly the only intention of your post is more conflict without actually resolving anything. The statement that liberals are nicer than conservatives is simply ignorant, as is the statement that conservatives are nicer than liberals.
The labels are trivial, and if you fail to question information presented with a critical mind there is no point is engaging in a discussion about it, as there is no logical basis for your position - it is purely emotional, based on a habitual position, a regurgitation of your conditioned "knowledge", and contributes nothing of value to a reasonable discussion.
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