Gallupping governments! How much trust voters have in their state Governments.

Gallup surveyed voters in all fifty states to assess how much trust they had in their local state government.  The results were illuminating but not surprising.  First of all, many of the most homogeneous states with small populations like North Dakota, Wyoming, Utah, South Dakota and Nebraska had high levels of trust in their governments while many of the largest, most diverse states like California, Illinois, New York and Florida, had below average levels of trust.  The big outlier was Texas, which at 72% had the sixth highest trust level of any state, despite being perhaps the most diverse and rapidly changing polity in the nation.  And some small, homogeneous places did very badly, states like Maine, Rhode Island and Connecticut. Not surprisingly, governments that are good at paying their bills tend to be trusted more while states with poor credit ratings aren't.



One other correlate of trust is ideology.  With the exception of Purple Iowa and New Hampshire, all of the high trust states are reliably red.  And with the exception of Appalachian Kentucky and West Virginia and historically corrupt Louisiana, all of the low trust states are blue or purple. There are no diverse, high trust blue or purple states. The most striking result is between the five highly diverse mega states:  California, New York, Florida and Illinois voters all express a low level of trust while Texas voters express a very high level of trust in their government. This is a nice confirmation of part of Public Choice theory which proposes that activist governments in very diverse and rapidly changing polities will have significant trust and legitimacy issues as the various factions war against each other for the spoils that hyperactive governance throws off.  Someone is always getting something at someone else's expense.  By contrast lassiez faire Texas has a much more modest state government that doesn't pit different racial and ethnic groups against each other nearly so much.  A result that our leaders in Washington would be wise to note if they care for the Federal government's long term legitimacy.....and viability.

One other observation:  The Gallup analysis studiously avoided noticing he striking difference between Texas and the other mega states via the trick of pretending that Texas wasn't a red or Republican state or indeed existed at all.

You can hide your head in the sand but all you end up with is your ass in the perfect position to be kicked.