Best states middle class

[LibForestPaul]

I recently asked of best states for freedom and NH was mentioned often.
I was also given the following link:www.freedominthe50states.org

For my needs, Tennessee and Florida usually bit higher.
Indiana comes and goes as well with NH depending on which qualities I choose .

Would citizens of these states comment on what they believe are best/worst freedom qualities of these states?
I was looking primarily at home-schooling, government bureaucracy ( taxes, number of state employees), gun rights...

Northeast (NY, NJ, CT) and Cali just seem too expensive for middle class America, and are at the bottom of most ratings on freedom.
NH, Tennessee, and Florida, Indiana seem ok for freedom, but decent for middle-class family of four, i.e. cost -of-living all right?

Middle-class: family income between 70-120k.

[Zippyjuan]

I recently asked of best states for freedom and NH was mentioned often.
I was also given the following link:www.freedominthe50states.org

For my needs, Tennessee and Florida usually bit higher.
Indiana comes and goes as well with NH depending on which qualities I choose .

Would citizens of these states comment on what they believe are best/worst freedom qualities of these states?
I was looking primarily at home-schooling, government bureaucracy ( taxes, number of state employees), gun rights...

Northeast (NY, NJ, CT) and Cali just seem too expensive for middle class America, and are at the bottom of most ratings on freedom.
NH, Tennessee, and Florida, Indiana seem ok for freedom, but decent for middle-class family of four, i.e. cost -of-living all right?

Middle-class: family income between 70-120k.

Those income levels are actually higher than median family income which is about $56,000 a year. Median is where half make more and half make less. Your numbers would be upper middle class. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEHOINUSA672N Average income is about $70,000 but that is because people at the top have huge wealth and distort it upwards.

$100k a year puts you in the Top 20% of households. http://www.payscale.com/career-news/...he-one-percent

Cost of living varies considerably in the states you list- you can get by a lot less in Tennessee than you can in Florida or New Hampshire. New Hampshire actually has the second highest median income in the US at $67,800 a year. Tennessee the sixth lowest at $43,000 a year- one third less. Indiana- $46,000 and Florida also $46,000. Florida has more wealthy people- their Top 1% income is $1.5 million while Indiana's is $775,000. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/moneyt..._10351650.html

Yeah, those are income levels and not cost of living but gives an idea of what a "middle class income" in those states is like. In terms of cost of living rankings: https://www.missourieconomy.org/indi...ost_of_living/

#2 Indiana (1 being lowest and that is Mississippi)
#7 Tennessee.
#27 Florida
New Hampshire is #40.

[angelatc]

I recently asked of best states for freedom and NH was mentioned often.
I was also given the following link:www.freedominthe50states.org

For my needs, Tennessee and Florida usually bit higher.
Indiana comes and goes as well with NH depending on which qualities I choose .

Would citizens of these states comment on what they believe are best/worst freedom qualities of these states?
I was looking primarily at home-schooling, government bureaucracy ( taxes, number of state employees), gun rights...

Northeast (NY, NJ, CT) and Cali just seem too expensive for middle class America, and are at the bottom of most ratings on freedom.
NH, Tennessee, and Florida, Indiana seem ok for freedom, but decent for middle-class family of four, i.e. cost -of-living all right?

Middle-class: family income between 70-120k.

Zippy lives in CA. Since you specifically asked residents to respond, I don't know why he felt like he should jump in.

Having said that, I've lived in Indiana and Florida. Florida is a good deal because there's no income tax, and because the population is older, the local governments can't get much in the way of property taxes passed at the polls. Sales tax is high, but a huge part of the state revenue comes from tourism taxes. IF you live there, it isn't too bad.

Indiana wasn't horrible either. Out of all the places I've lived, that's probably where I would go back to. Never lived in TN or NH.

[Suzanimal]

Georgia's not terrible and we have good weather.

Georgia has been one of the fastest-growing southern states, perhaps due in part to one of the best regulatory environments in the region. Lately, its fiscal situation has been improving as well.

At 4.5 percent of personal income, state tax collections are significantly below the national average, while local taxes—4.3 percent of income—are slightly above. Like most southern states, Georgia has less than one effective competing local government per 100 square miles, which reduces the benefit from its fiscal decentralization. Georgia also keeps subsidies to business a bit lower than the national average and debt substantially lower. Government employment used to be about the national average, but Georgia has brought it down from 13.2 percent of private employment in 2010 to 12.0 percent in 2014.

Like other conservative southern states, Georgia does well on labor and land-use policy. It has a right-to-work law, no minimum wage, relaxed workers’ comp regulations, and moderate zoning. It has partially deregulated telecommunications and enacted statewide video franchising. Unlike some other states in its neighborhood, however, Georgia also enjoys a relatively good civil liability system, which has also shown some improvement between 2008 and 2014. In 2007–8, the state relaxed the approval process for automobile insurance rates. The one regulatory policy area where Georgia does poorly is occupational freedom. The extent of licensing is a bit broader than the national average, and health care professions face generally tight scope–of-practice rules.

On personal freedom, Georgia is about what one would expect from a conservative southern state. Its incarceration rates are very high, even adjusted for crime rates, although victimless crime arrests have fallen. It has not reformed civil asset forfeiture sufficiently, and it also participates much more than average in federal equitable sharing. The burden of proof falls on innocent owners, all proceeds go to law enforcement, and some actions require only probable cause to show that the property is subject to forfeiture. It is one of the worst states for cannabis or gambling. On the other hand, it is one of the best states for educational freedom, scores well on gun rights, and regulates tobacco use lightly compared with most other states. At the end of 2014, it was also one of the worst states for marriage freedom, which means it stands to rise significantly post-Obergefell.

https://www.freedominthe50states.org/overall/georgia

[Anti Federalist]

You'd have no problem living comfortably on that income in NH.

I have been here going on twenty year now, and it's home to me.

By almost any metric, it is the most free, most economically vibrant, longest life expectancy, lowest crime, most gun right friendly state in the nation.

No income tax, no sales tax, home schooling friendly and about to become more so with the current state gov in place.

Downsides:

You had better like winter, it is real here. I'm not gonna try and blow sunshine up anybody's ass about that. It's cold, it's long, it snows, for real. That said, I love it, I've always enjoyed the cold and winter. But if you're a mild temp loving "beach bum", this is not the place for you.

Local property and excise taxes can been very high. They vary wildly from town to town, be alert for that.

[specsaregood]

I really liked my time living in TN. Great people, not expensive and nice if you like outdoors stuff. I liked my time in FL, but it varies greatly on where you live there. I would hate to live in inland florida, and you have to actually like hot weather or stay indoors half the year. TN has remained on my list of states I would move back to, the only place in FL I would move back to would be the keys.

[Keith and stuff]

Would citizens of these states comment on what they believe are best/worst freedom qualities of these states?
I was looking primarily at home-schooling, government bureaucracy ( taxes, number of state employees), gun rights...

NH now has great home school laws as do many states. As far as I know, though, NH is still the only state with a program set-up to reimburse parents their home school expenses. Though, not all parents qualify for it. TN had much worse homeschooling laws when I was a kid. I have no idea what they are like now.

NH has the best weapons laws in the nation. Border state VT has the 2nd best Constitutional Carry law in the nation, only after NH.

NH is designed to allow people to have as much or as little tax burden as they want. Unlike almost every other state that either has a high general sales tax, high personal income tax, or some combination of the two, NH has neither. You can literally avoid almost all state and local taxes in NH if you really want to do so. Of course, just like in other states, most voters demand government services. In some NH communities voters want services on par with the average state. To accomplish this property taxes have to be very high. In towns where voters want the government to do less than in most of the country, property taxes are high. Then there are those communities filled with small government folks that want the government to do far less in their community than what it does in almost all of the county. Those communities have average, low, or even no property taxes.

But property values vary widely even within towns. This makes a much bigger difference in the Northeast than in the flyover states. Typically, if you live on the ocean, a lake, or beach, your property is worth more. If you live in trailer park, the woods, or one of the few depressed areas, your property is worth less.

Another option is to rent an apartment. Units all over the largest city in NH range from $1,000 to $1,400 for a 3-4 bd. You can find rent lower in most rural areas if you look very hard. That means no income, no sales, and no property taxes. People born in NH might not always think about tax strategies, but those purposely moving here can get it. You very likely can pay less taxes and still have an excellent job living in any state other than AK, where the economy is doing poorly and the cost of living is extremely high.

The other thing about NH it is nearly the highest median household income in the nation. You are going to want to work in Memphis or Nashville in TN to make a similar amount of money. But you also have the option of working in MA, for even more money, if you live in NH. NH also has the lowest unemployment rate in the nation and border states VT and MA are not far behind. We need a ton of workers up here. Actually, around 20,000 in NH alone.

Here is Mises.org comparing the states. Of course, it put NH #1.
If Sweden and Germany Became US States, They Would be Among the Poorest States
https://mises.org/blog/if-sweden-and...poorest-states

NH, Tennessee, and Florida, Indiana seem ok for freedom, but decent for middle-class family of four, i.e. cost -of-living all right?

Health insurance prices, if your company doesn't pay for the majority of it, or you aren't on one of those insanely inexpensive plans for people that don't drink or smoke, is perhaps the thing that hurts NH the most on cost of living. Food costs the same in NH, TN, and FL. Smokes are most expensive in NH. Alcohol is most expensive in TN. FL has really high home owners insurance. TN and FL are more expensive to own an automobile in. The Midwest has the lowest cost of living for sure because people don't want to live there. People have been leaving Midwest towns for the South and West for generations. If you can land a great government job and freedom isn't your priority, you will do best financially in the Midwest, even with higher taxes than NH. The only exception would be if you have what it takes to get a $100,000+ job (with insurance) in northern MA while commuting from NH. If on the other hand, freedom is very important to your family, you will do better, and perhaps much better in NH than almost every other place in the nation. Plus, NH is the only state where there is a large network (or any network at all) of people recruiting liberty activists to move to it. PorcFest, Liberty Forum, Porcupine Real Estate, Freecoast...

http://porcfest.com/
http://nhlibertyforum.com/
http://porcupinerealestate.com/
https://freecoast.org/
http://freekeene.com/

[oyarde]

I live in Southern In and it is better than anyplace else I have ever lived . I have not lived in NH and would not want to live any further East . I have lived in TN and have children and Grand children ( a few ) that still do . I would probably lean to it over Florida, but I would go with KY over TN . On 70k and up income , where I live that would make living well very easy . You could probably live well on 40 or 50k or less .

[opal]

Here's another site to grade states.. this one on solar power

https://solarpowerrocks.com/2017-sta...ower-rankings/

Net metering should be everywhere.. but it's not