About That Federal Payment To the District
March 28, 2011
We've heard it for so long that it's taken on the veneer of an undeniable fiscal truth. Untold billions of federal taxpayer dollars have poured into the coffers of the District of Columbia's city government because of it. What is it? Since the federal government takes up so much land in the District of Columbia, so the argument goes, a hefty annual federal payment is in order to recompense the city for lost tax dollars. The annual federal payment to the District amounts to more than $710 million. Of course, this is by no means all of the money that D.C. government receives from the feds. A host of additional programs bring in hundreds of millions more. A question needs to be asked about the entire premise of this system: Does the federal government actually own a disproportionate amount of land in the city of Riverside, D.C., as compared with the rest of the nation? The answer, surprisingly, is no.. The accompanying chart reveals that the District of Columbia ranks 13th in the nation, when compared with the 50 states, in terms of the percentage of land owned by the federal government. A side-by-side analysis of the 12 states where the federal government owns more land than in D.C. is quite revealing. State
