http://kutv.com/news/local/utah-listed-as-43rd-federally-dependent-state-in-the-union

I don't know what this all means exactly,but it seems like I was always taught that mormons were very self-reliant and took care of each other, not depending on any handouts.

This article is about Utah NOT depending on the Federal government. #43 in the country, of dependent states. #1 is the highest, #50 is the least dependent.

Whoops...totally interpreted that wrong. ok, never mind.

No worries. I like to slam Utah for their constant hypocrisy. But, this isn't one of those times.

And Utah is the second most federally owned state, meaning lands not in state control. This makes PILT payment in Lieu of Taxes a big deal for the state coffers.

Yes, PILT payments are a big deal, and the study left out a lot of other factors. For instance, in Wyoming we receive $3 from the federal government for every $1 we give to the federal government. As a state with a large federal land management presence I would expect Utah to be similar. These monies include low grazing fees (it cost way more to manage the range than what ranchers pay), farming tax breaks (fuels etc., are tax free for ranchers), subsidized improvements through the NRCS, as well as minerals (oil, gas, coal and uranium mostly) severance and other taxes. Most western states, with lots of federally managed lands, are dependent upon the federal government for survival.

I was surprised by that article. There isn't enough information to understand what is included in things like "Federal Contracts," so I'm not sure what to infer.

But I think it is wrong.

The last time I looked, and it has been a decade, I used a different metric: the one Richard uses. And the numbers were the same--Utah received three dollars in federal spending for each dollar of revenues remitted to Washington. Besides his items, it turns out that Hill Air Force Base and other military facilities absorb huge amounts of federal money as well.

I suspect the methodology underlying the article cited above is incorrect, that it only includes subsets of overall federal transfers to Utah and thereby reaches the conclusion that Utah is not dependent on federal subsidies. I don't believe that is an accurate picture.