The loss in California's property tax revenue alone is almost certainly larger than Wyoming's entire budget. When you add in the Federal grants that states get, which tend to disproportionately help the smaller, more rural states, it's no surprise that the empty red states have a better balance sheet.
I feel this point needs reinforcing. Let's look at the Census Bureau's numbers for
Federal Aid to State Governments over some recent years, 2000-2007. And those of you insisting that a little personal, moral, and fiscal responsibility in government would solve the spending question should pay close attention, and strain your brains to remember which people were in charge of federal spending at the time. Compare these to
state populations, specifically the biggest state (California, running at a whopping deficit) versus the smallest state (Wyoming, running a tiny surplus):
California - 36.9 million people, $46billion in aid in 2005 = $1250 per person.
Wyoming - 0.5 million people, $2billion in aid in 2005 = $4000 per person.
For more information, you can check out
some work by Gary Richardson - the article is subscription only, but you can analyze his spreadsheet data yourself, the last tab lists out Federal Taxes and Federal Expenditures. Low and behold, it's the populated, "socialist" states footing the bill for rural, "responsible" states, because those empty states love infrastructure as much as anybody but have fewer people and even lower taxes to pay for anything. Might be related to
Republicans clambering over each other for money from that stimulus package they all voted against and insist to this day had absolutely no positive effect on the economy or any state. Might also be related to the 25 least populous states being home to a sixth of the population (the most rural, conservative sixth) being represented by half of the Senate, while the nine states home to half the population get 18 Senators to balance them.