Turn me loose, set me free

Original article:	boulderweekly.com/waynesword.html
Date:	11/14/02
Title:	Turn me loose, set me free
Author:	Wayne Laugesen
Publication:	Boulder Weekly

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Turn me loose, set me free

By Wayne Laugesen • 11/14/02

Grab your gun, and tell the old lady to start packin' up the kids. It's time to move to Wyoming to create a free state. That's exactly what libertarian-minded people, from all over the country, are planning to do in droves.

For too long, Libertarians have comprised the party of refreshing and popular ideas but no results. Like members of all third parties, Libertarians have enjoyed victories that are really just hollow consolations. Libertarians, for example, took majority control of an entire city council recently. Unfortunately, the pothole politics of Leadville, Colo., don't free American citizens from oppressive taxes, big business and excessive government.

What Libertarians need, if they are to become a real player in American politics, is this: two members in the United States Senate, at least one member of the U.S. House of Representatives, and a governor. (Holding onto the Leadville City Council won't hurt them, either!)

How do they accomplish this substantive step toward the major leagues? They take over Wyoming, Vermont, or one of the other 10 states (or the District of Columbia) that consist of fewer than 1.5 million residents. (Other possible targets are: Idaho; Maine; New Hampshire; Hawaii; Rhode Island; Montana; Delaware; South Dakota; North Dakota; and Alaska)

The invasion of one of these states will happen within the next decade. In the works is a well-organized political maneuver headed by the Free State Project. Already, more than 1,500 Libertarians have signed a pledge to move to the soon-to-be-freed state once the organizers of the project decide which state to liberate. The goal is to get 20,000 Libertarians or libertarian-minded people to commit to taking over a state by moving to it and voting.

Getting 20,000 people to agree to live free is no gargantuan task, so don't make the mistake of writing this off as a pie-in-the-sky dream of the political fringe. And don't make the mistake of thinking 20,000 hardcore voters, who all believe in less government and lower taxes, isn't enough to take over most federal, state and local political offices in an entire state.

Wyoming, which would be the best selection, consists of only 493,782 people. Wyoming has fewer people than live in the tiny cities of Wichita, Kans., or Colorado Springs. Wyoming's population base isn't twice the size of Boulder County's. Would it be a stretch to believe in an effort by all the country's Libertarians to control the politics of Wichita? Nope. So it should be no harder to visualize a successful political coup in Wyoming.

Despite Wyoming's sparse population, it has as much clout in the United States Senate as does California-a state that's home to 33,871,648 people-or 33,377,866 more people than live in Wyoming. California has two Senators; Wyoming has two Senators. Each U.S. Senator, whether from California or Wyoming, has one vote on any given bill. Likewise, California has one governor; Wyoming has one governor. Wyoming has one U.S. Representative, even though the state's entire population falls short of comprising a congressional district.

Liberal Democrats-who hold the uneducated view that America is a "democracy"-loathe this dynamic of American politics. They would like to see the Electoral College vanish, so the urban majority could dominate all aspects of American government. The founders knew better than to allow that to occur. They knew that pure democracy would result in tyranny of the majority, not liberty. So they designed a system that empowers minorities so much power that they enjoy a mighty hedge against mob rule. We're not a "democracy," but a constitutional republic that employs some democratic principles such as elections. If we were a pure democracy, my right to own guns would have long ago been taken by a whimsical vote of the majority. My right to publish editorials that ridicule the majority would have long ago been taken away. If this were a democracy, the opportunity for a minority political group to take over an entire state-a state with seemingly lopsided clout-would have been nixed by now.

Wyoming is so important to the national political landscape that outside interests pumped tens of millions of dollars into the most recent senatorial race. ABC's Robert Krulwich ran the numbers in creative ways designed to give people some idea of how much money individual votes are worth in a state with fewer than a half million residents. Krulwich proved that with the money spent on the Senate race, mostly by outside sources, each candidate could have taken each potential voter to dinner 11 times.

Money doesn't guarantee victory, even in a tiny state, because the other side of a two-party political system can usually match the spending dollar-for-dollar. Human infiltration, however, can't be defeated. Imagine 20,000 voters, who each cast straight pro-liberty ballots, diluting the tiny electorate of Wyoming. Also consider the fact that Wyoming-like Vermont, the second smallest state with 608,932 residents-already has libertarian leanings. Both are rural states, where the native culture tends to value self-sufficiency while rejecting the kind of urban interdependence that statist, liberal, big-government politicians so like to exploit.

After moving 20,000 voters to a small state, here's what the Free State Project hopes to do: repeal state taxes and wasteful state government programs; end grants and collaboration between state and federal law enforcement; repeal all state gun control and drug prohibition; end asset forfeiture and abuses of eminent domain; privatize utilities and untwist big business monopolies. When all that's done, the free-staters plan to negotiate with the federal government for a return of the state's constitutional autonomy.

Then, let's hope they'll "take over" and free a few more states.

Respond: letters@boulderweekly.com

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Wyoming one of four states

Original article:	newsobserver.com/nc24hour/ncnews/ story/1812368p-1810946c.html
Date:	10/13/02
Title:	Wyoming one of four states targeted for Libertarian plan
Author:	Associated Press
Publication:	News Observer

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Wyoming one of four states targeted for Libertarian plan

By Associated Press • 10/13/02

CHEYENNE, Wyo.(AP) – A North Carolina man is targeting Wyoming, Delaware, New Hampshire and Alaska for an experiment to overhaul a state's government and wean it from federal control.

Jason Sorens, 25, a Yale University political science doctoral candidate, Libertarian and founder of the Free State Project, plans to enlist 20,000 "liberty-oriented individuals" to move to a state and reform its laws, from criminal codes to tax structure.

The government's only role should be to defend citizens from force and fraud, he believes.

Drug and gun laws would be repealed, and asset forfeiture and abuses of eminent domain would end, the project's Web site states. Utilities would be privatized, and inefficient regulations and monopolies would be eliminated.

The plan includes opting out of federal mandates and ultimately negotiating with the federal government for appropriate political autonomy. The threat of secession would be used, if needed, as leverage.

"We think government is too large, too distant, and we also think that we need to get back a bit more to our constitutional principles and start to take the Constitution seriously," Sorens said recently from his home in Asheville, N.C.

Sorens said his group, which has 1,220 members, faces a self-imposed deadline of September 2006 to recruit 20,000. He hopes to entice 5,000 members by September 2004, which is when a state will be chosen.

"I think we have a good shot at it," he said. "But if we were unable to reach 5,000 by then, we would really have to consider whether to pursue the project."

Population is the critical factor, the group says. With 20,000 activists, it could influence only states with fewer than 1.5 million residents or states where less than $10 million is spent on political campaigns in any election cycle, project research has shown.

Other criteria include coastal access for trade, lack of dependence on federal funds, a decent job market and a certain Libertarian streak.

"We're looking at states that are already pro-freedom and pro-small government," he said. "Of course we will be interested in making some changes; however, these aren't going to be drastic changes, and we're going to start very humbly.

"We're not going to come in like gangbusters, obviously."

Wyoming's economy and landlocked status would hurt the state's chances to become the testing ground, but Sorens said both might be overcome.

He said secession is not the goal but the bargaining chip.

"I doubt that any American state would actually go through with that, but the very idea of the possibility should make it easier for us to achieve concessions with the federal government," Sorens said.

U.S. Attorney for Wyoming Matthew Mead said the project's backers would have a difficult time circumventing federal law if that is the intention.

"Of course they're free to move to this state or any other state," he said. "And if they want to try to change state law, they're free to do that. ... But they will be subject to the same federal laws as everyone else."

Libertarian candidate for governor Dave Dawson supports the Free State Project. He has advocated less government at every turn on the campaign trail, pushing for repeal of federal income taxes and handing education, health care and other government programs to the private sector.

"It's a great idea," he said of the Free State Project. "The problem is getting Libertarians to do something all together is a lot like herding cats."

Dawson said he would love to see the plan succeed but doesn't think Wyoming is the place. The state is not as independently minded as everyone thinks, he said.

Still, he said, "I think it's realistic. It's certainly not easy."

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State Report WY 2: Wyoming Report # 2

Wyoming Report # 2

by Keith Carlsen

(With additional research and editing by a half-dozen other Free State Project members)

Disclaimer: This report covers many of the political aspects of Wyoming in detail but, it does not cover all areas because it is intended as a supplement to the 1st and 3rd Wyoming Reports. However, since it was written at the same time as the 3rd Report, there is some overlap. The author of this report has put over 400 hours of research and thought into the question of which candidate state is best for the Free State Project. The author is from a large eastern metropolitan center (Memphis, TN) and originally opted-out of every state west of the Mississippi, but has since developed a bias towards Wyoming and opted-back-in every state except North Dakota.

Major Areas Covered

Ability to Succeed Government and Taxes Guns, Laws, and Resistance to the Federal Government Groups That Could Work Against Freedom Miscellaneous Factors Conclusion

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I. Ability to Succeed

There are currently 10 states under consideration by the FSP. These are (alphabetically):

Alaska (AK), Delaware (DE), Idaho (ID), Maine (ME), Montana (MT), New Hampshire (NH), North Dakota (ND), South Dakota (SD), Vermont (VT), and Wyoming (WY).

Several critical factors combine in Wyoming, to make it one of the most likely states to succeed. These factors are:

1. Overall population
2. Number of voters
3. Expense of elections
4. Political climate
5. Citizen ideology
6. Cost of living

The first five factors are some of the most important factors for determining which candidate state should prevail, while the last factor is the trump card.

Wyoming is the only state where these six factors combine in such an FSP-friendly way. Look at the data for yourself:

1. Overall population for selected states

   WY	498,703	Best of all 10 states
   SD	761,063
   MT	909,453
   NH	1,275,056
   ID	1,341,131	Worst of all 10 states

2. Number of voters (in 2000 election) for selected states

   WY	213,000	Best of all 10 states
   SD	316,000
   MT	411,000
   ID	488,000
   NH	567,000	Worst of all 10 states

3. Expense of elections (highest recent election) for selected states

   ND	$4,300,000	Best of all 10 states
   WY	$4,700,000	3rd of all 10 states
   ID	$7,700,000
   MT	$10,900,000
   SD	$18,800,000
   NH	$19,600,000	Worst of all 10 states

4. Political climate (% small government vote for President in 2000) for selected states

   WY	70.0%	Best of all 10 states
   ID	68.0%
   SD	61.0%
   MT	59.0%
   NH	48.5%
   DE	42.0%
   VT	41.5%	Worst of all 10 states

5. Citizen ideology towards small government principles

   ID	73.7	Best of all 10 states
   AK	66.9
   WY	66.1	3rd of all 10 states
   NH	63.7
   MT	56.9
   SD	53.2
   DE	47.9
   ND	45.3
   ME	35.5
   VT	25.8	Worst of all 10 states

   Interpretations: Out of the five factors most critical to the success of the Free State Project, Wyoming is the best state three times and the third state two times. Idaho is the worst state once, and both New Hampshire and Vermont are each ranked the worst state two times. According to the five most important factors, no other state is even in the same ballpark as Wyoming. Wyoming has around one-half the population, voters, and expense of elections as compared to the large states and is much more small-government friendly than all of the small states (except Alaska). In this regard, Wyoming has the best of both worlds.

   Source: All of the statistics come from Jason's spreadsheet.

6. Cost of living

   What about the trump card – cost of living?

   Having a high cost of living hurts a state. The reason? Not everyone who wants to help the FSP will be able to move to the chosen state. Some people will have to take care of their elderly parents; others might not be able to move because the cold exacerbates the arthritis in their knees or they are divorced and want to be near their children; some people might think that they are making progress towards liberty in warm, dry, and sunny New Mexico. There are many other possible reasons. However, these folks might still be willing to help the FSP's chosen state out, financially. Should the FSP just give up on these people? NO! We should encourage them to help us out the only way they can, by financially supporting the various freedom projects that will be going on in the chosen state.

   Right about now, you maybe saying, "That does make sense, let them help us. However, what does that have to do with cost of living?" Simply this: money goes further in a state with a low mean household income than in a state with a high mean household income. The people that choose to stay in New York City, San Diego, San Francisco, Chicago, Las Vegas, Miami, or Atlanta and make $100,000 per year, are likely to give the same amount of money to the freedom movements of the chosen state no matter which state is picked. That money will go much further in a state like Wyoming where the cost of living is low, than it will in New Hampshire or Alaska where the cost of living is very high. It is not a coincidence that Wyoming and North Dakota have lower costs of living than New Hampshire and Vermont do. Wyoming's cost of living is around 93% of the national average, which compares very favorably to 103% for Delaware, 108% for New Hampshire, and 123% for Anchorage AK.

   Housing costs must also be considered as part of this equation. If a family owns 50% of a house that costs $300,000 in California and sells that house, they will have around $150,000 to buy a new house in the chosen state. Now, would that $150,000 buy a better house and more land in a state like Wyoming with low housing and land costs, or in a state like New Hampshire with high housing and land costs? The answer is clear: the family benefits more by moving to Wyoming than it does by moving to New Hampshire.

   What about the opposite? For example, if an average family from Alabama or Oklahoma wants to move to the chosen state and owns 25% of their $100,000 house, this money goes further in the low housing cost environment of Wyoming than in the high housing cost environment of New Hampshire. It might be so hard for the family to get a house in New Hampshire they are forced to live in a low-quality apartment. I know this is not the end of the world (I currently live in an apartment) but it is still an issue for that family.

   Wyoming does not have a low average household income, either. Wyoming's average household income is only around $1,000 below the national average, or $38,000. However, after Wyoming's average household income is adjusted for cost of living, it is slightly higher than the national average. Four of the other candidate states have higher mean household incomes than Wyoming while five have lower ones. This puts Wyoming about in the middle. If you want to take this strategy to the extreme, Montana is lowest with an average household income of $33,000. However, in my opinion, that is too low. Wyoming, on the other hand is just around the national average. This is good, because this means the money coming to Wyoming will be worth more in the local economy than the money would be in Alaska or New Hampshire, but at the same time the people from Wyoming will be able to afford to buy out-of-state products and travel out of state.

Alternative theory on ability to succeed – Robert Hawes, a fellow Porcupine posted an alternative list of major factors for success to the FSP Forum. He goes about it a different way but still picks Wyoming as the top candidate state.

Population, again – Let me go back to the most important factor: population. This is the most important factor because we have to assume that none of the states are as liberty and small government oriented as the FSP members are, otherwise the FSP would have never been created. The candidate states have been chosen based on one main factor, population. Lots of Jason's original research dealt with the Parti Quebecois of Quebec, Canada. Jason, the founder and President of the Free State Project, described how the PQ had 100,000 paying members in a Canadian province with around 6,200,000 residents when it gained a parliamentary majority in 1976. This makes one PQ activist for every 62 Quebec residents. The FSP would need 20,000 activists in a state with fewer than 1,200,000 residents to attempt to duplicate the PQ's success. If you never read Jason's article or want to read it again, you can find it here.

How do the candidate states measure up to this important barrier?

State	Population (2002)	Pop. Divided by 20K Activists
WY	498,703	24.9
VT	616,592	30.8
ND	634,110	31.7
AK	643,786	32.1
SD	761,063	38.0
DE	807,385	40.3
MT	909,453	45.4
NH	1,275,056	63.7*
ME	1,294,464	64.7*
ID	1,341,131	67.0*

* Over the limit of 62

Jason has speculated that if the FSP does not get 20,000 members the project will fold and a new, looser-organized project will take its place and probably decide to move to a small state like Wyoming. If people move to the selected state before the project has 20,000 members, this might be a disaster for the FSP. These people will be unlikely to move again; after all, they just spent thousands of dollars to move to the chosen state. This means the FSP members will be split between the chosen state and Wyoming and neither group will succeed. The other possibility is that most people will decide to move to the chosen state anyway, and the project will fail because it will lack enough members to make changes in the chosen state. If Wyoming is not picked, then the project might not even get off the ground. However, if Wyoming is picked and 20,000 members do not sign up, Wyoming will still be the back-up state when Jason shuts down the project. This means that people can move early to Wyoming and not have to worry about moving again, or inadvertently splitting the project, unlike all of the other states.

I have studied the data and talked with people that have lived or currently live in the states. There is nothing that makes the more populous states such as New Hampshire and Idaho two and one-half to three times as good as Wyoming. Given these numbers, the real question seems to be, why should we not pick Wyoming, as opposed to why should we pick a more populous state?

What if a large amount of people drop out of the project in a few years? The project will be doomed in a large-population state like Idaho, but it will likely still succeed in Wyoming. A quote on the FSP Forum, by a fellow Porcupine, says, "After we finally make the vote, chances are a good chunk of us will bow out; estimates on the initial loss of membership range from 10% to 25%. This will happen regardless of which state is chosen." It just makes sense to err on the safe side. Remember, this is our future and the future of our dream – freedom. If we bite off more than we can chew, this unique opportunity for "freedom in our lifetime" might be forever lost. We must start small and work from there. We should not fool around with freedom and pick a state because it has a beach, a casino resort, or a Chinese restaurant in every town! Sure, these are factors that deserve a small amount of consideration, but they are not as important as freedom.

II. Government and Taxes

• General

  The Republican, Democratic, and Libertarian Party are the only major political parties in Wyoming. Wyoming, unlike six other candidate states (including Alaska, New Hampshire, Vermont, and Idaho) actually has term limits for its legislature. Wyoming has a ballot initiative process, unlike New Hampshire, but it is regulated more than it should be.

• District Sizes

  Wyoming's House has 60 members: 45 Republicans and 15 Democrats, each representing around 8,200 residents. This compares favorably to most states, including Montana, South Dakota, Alaska, and especially Idaho, which has huge districts consisting of over 36,500 residents per district. New Hampshire has some districts with over 21,000 residents but also has some very small districts. This means the 400 members of the New Hampshire House have much less influence than the 60 members of the Wyoming House.

  House District Sizes
  (2000 figures)

  State	House District Size	Reps
  VT	4,059 to 8,118	150
  WY	8,230	60
  ME	8,443	151
  MT	9,022	100
  SD	10,783	70
  ND	13,106	98
  AK	15,673	40
  DE	19,112	41
  NH	3,089 to 21,559	400
  ID	36,962	70

  Source: Joe Swyers

  The Wyoming Senate has 30 members with a party breakdown of 20 Republicans and 10 Democrats, each representing around 16,500 residents. This compares very favorably to most states. For example, Montana has 18,189, Alaska has 32,189, Maine has over 36,500, Idaho has over 38,300, Delaware has over 38,400, and New Hampshire has over 53,000 residents per Senate district.

  Senate District Sizes (rounded)
  (2002 figures)

  State	Senate District Size
  ND	13,500
  WY	16,500
  MT	18,100
  VT	20,500
  SD	21,700
  AK	32,100	Only 20 Senators
  ME	36,500
  ID	38,300
  DE	38,400
  NH	53,000	Only 24 Senators

  When both House and Senate district sizes are considered, Wyoming is about equal to Vermont for small district sizes. When you consider Wyoming has term limits and a ballot initiative process, it moves even farther ahead of the pack. Wyoming is clearly one of the easiest states to access as far as state legislative assembly is considered. When all four factors are considered, New Hampshire, Delaware, and Idaho stand out as being the hardest to access as far as state legislative assembly is considered. These states are hindered by not having term limits, and New Hampshire does not even have a ballot initiative process.

• State Deficit

  Wyoming is one of the few states in the country with no deficit. Wyoming had a surplus in 2002 and has a reserve fund. On the other hand, Alaska, Maine, New Hampshire, and South Dakota have growing debts. This has caused some parts of Alaska to start collecting a general sales tax and a growing fight in New Hampshire between groups that want to raise the income tax and groups that want to raise the property tax. This issue is important because the residents of a state will be much less likely to lower taxes (like the FSP wants) if the state is experiencing a growing budget shortfall.

  State Budget Deficits ($Millions)

  State	2003 Deficit (Projected)	2002 Deficit
  WY	0.0	0.0
  ND	7.6	7.4
  SD	36.1	19.6
  VT	38.0	67.1
  DE	41.8	0.0
  NH	54.6	19.7
  ID	75.0	221.0
  MT	118.0	0.0
  ME	243.0	150.8
  AK	842.7	777.4

  [Source]

• Taxes

  What about the overall tax issues? Wyoming is already one of the most appealing states in the nation for tax purposes. Only three of the candidate states have no personal income taxes, and Wyoming is one of them. Only one of the candidate states has absolutely no corporate income tax, Wyoming is that state. Wyoming's property tax rates are about half of the national average. Even the sales taxes are low in Wyoming, but many Wyoming sales taxes can be avoided by using planned purchasing strategies. Much of Wyoming is only two to three hours away from Billings or Bozeman MT where there is no general sales tax. In Wyoming, many people routinely barter for goods and services. Usually these barter activities go unreported to the IRS. In addition, most goods may be bought over the internet or second hand and are not subject to sales taxes.

  Here are rankings for the major tax rates:

  Income Tax

  WY, AK, SD	None
  NH, ND	Low
  DE, MT, ID	Average
  VT, ME	Very High

  Sales Tax

  MT, DE, NH, AK	Very Low
  ID, VT, ME, WY, SD	Low
  ND	Average

  Corp. Income Tax

  WY	None
  SD, MT	Low
  AK, ID	Average
  ME, DE, ND, NH*, VT	High

  * NH also has a Business Enterprise tax

  Property Tax

  WY	DE	ID	MT	AK	SD	VT	ME	NH
  Best								Worst

  (I am not sure if I am using the best source for this table. However, I am certain that WY has the lowest and NH the highest). No info for ND.

• Other tax issues

  States typically get most of their revenue from personal income, corporate income, sales, and property taxes. However, some states do not even tax one or two of these categories. The states that limit the types of taxes they impose on their citizens deserve extra recognition from FSP members. Tax cutting strategists and theorists have long recognized certain principles that are common to most state governments. One of the commonly recognized principles notes that all tax rates generally increase over time. Because of this, anti-tax groups tend to think that limiting the types of taxes is the best way to control government growth.

  Wyoming stands out as the only state that does not collect two different types of taxes. The citizens of Wyoming have done a better job controlling their state government's desire for more taxes than any of the other candidate states, according to this train of thought. In addition, Wyoming has no capital gains or death taxes, as some states do. Even Wyoming's gas and electric utility taxes are low.

  Absence of Taxes

  DE, MT, NH	No state or local general sales tax
  WY, AK, SD	No personal income tax
  WY, SD (only taxes financial companies)	No corporate tax
  NH	No wage tax, but: interest, dividend, and indirect income taxes (also see)
  ID, VT, ME, ND	Tax their citizens every which way they can!

  What is the difference between states with no income tax and states with no sales tax? Which is better? According to economists from the Austrian school (the best known libertarian economic school), not having an income tax is better than not having a sales tax. In addition, a sales tax, or consumption tax, is fairer than an income, or production tax. An income tax is more likely to hurt production than a sales tax is likely to hurt consumption. In fact, the Cato Institute, a leading libertarian policy organization, authored a policy report that explains why the federal government should end the national income tax and replace it with a national sales tax. Constitutional Republican Alan Keyes believes that a sales tax is more in line with Constitutional principles than an income tax. The Republican Liberty Caucus, a libertarian organization founded by Ron Paul (former Libertarian Party presidential candidate and the only libertarian U.S. Rep. in Congress), believes that a sales tax is more inline with freedom principles than an income tax. Also, the National Taxpayers Union is against both progressive and income taxes. This same principle holds true on a state level. In addition, sales taxes tend to be more in line with libertarian thought, because they are usually flat. On the other hand, state income taxes tend to be anti-libertarian because they usually have progressive rates. Again, the Cato Institute agrees with this train of thought.

  Not only that, but all of the candidate states except for North Dakota and Delaware are tourist hotspots. The tourists that visit these states are subject to state sales taxes but are not subject to state income taxes. This means that a state, which relies more on sales taxes receipts, places less of a tax burden on its citizens. For these reasons, states that do not have income taxes (like Wyoming) have an advantage over states that do have income taxes (like Idaho, New Hampshire, and Montana.)

• Low-tax strategies for individuals

  Low-tax strategies are important to some FSP members. These FSP members do not like to pay many taxes, and adjust their lives so that they may avoid as many taxes as possible. Wyoming is one of three candidate states without an income tax on wages, interest, or dividends and the only state that has no corporate tax. Wyoming, like many states with large rural populations, has a great deal of trade and barter activity. This activity usually goes unreported and is not counted as income. Wyoming has very low property taxes and borders sales-tax-free Montana. In fact, the metropolitan and shopping center of Montana (Billings) is less than two hours away from Sheridan, Cody, Lovell, and Powell WY. Wyoming residents from Gillette, Buffalo, Worland, and Jackson often shop in sales-tax-free Montana. These towns offer the unique opportunity (found no where else in the country) of no inventory, corporate, wage, interest, dividend, or sales tax, and very low franchise and property taxes. All of this, in addition to the barter trade, makes Wyoming the best state for low-tax strategies.

III. Guns, Laws, and Resistance to the Federal Government

• Guns

  Wyoming is a pro-gun state and has one of the most active gun cultures in the country. Wyoming passed a law that allows the state government to prevent lawsuits against the gun industry. Wyoming is tied with Vermont for having the least restrictive hunting laws. Joe Swyers, an individualist and elected city council member, ranked the 10 states hunting laws as:

  Hunting Laws (10 = best, 0 = worst)

  WY	VT	MT	AK	ID	ME	ND	NH	SD	DE
  10	10	9	8	7	3	3	2	1	0

  Many different animals are hunted in Wyoming, including black bear, cougar, coyote, turkey, jackrabbit, elk, antelope, deer, bighorn sheep, geese, duck, gray wolf (soon to be, if Wyoming gets its way), etc.

  Wyoming has "peaceable journey" laws. Even though there is no exact way to determine gun ownership rates, the best research estimates that 88% of households in Wyoming own a firearm. This is the highest percentage in the country and much higher than most of the eastern FSP states. The three lowest FSP state levels are Maine (48%), New Hampshire (36%), and Delaware (29%). [Source]

  A Wyoming resident does not need a permit to carry a handgun unless he or she wants to carry concealed. Many states legally allow open carry of handguns but in most of these states, open carry is not practical like it is in Wyoming. In Wyoming, even the tourists do not get scared when they see guns carried openly. The tourists just think it is part of one of the Old West shows, which are performed in many of Wyoming's towns during tourist season. Many people in large cities (especially east coast cities where handgun ownership rates are low, e.g. Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Providence) are afraid of guns. These people tend to react poorly when they see guns being carried openly. This is true of the Boston MSA (which includes much of southern New Hampshire) and of Delaware. This is also a problem in eastern South Dakota, which is one of the reasons so many people have concealed carry permits in South Dakota. I know open carry is also frowned upon in very liberal Burlington VT. My uncle, an NRA member from Burlington, even frowns upon concealed carry. Most likely, this is also a problem in Boise ID, Anchorage AK, and Portland ME.

  Wyoming has the third-highest rate of gun retailers in the nation, with 147 gun retailers per 100,000 residents. In fact, Wyoming actually has more gun retailers than the much higher population states of Maine and New Hampshire. Out of all 10 states, Wyoming has the second-highest rate of machine gun ownership, only behind New Hampshire. Wyoming has more machine guns in the hands of its citizens than Montana, South Dakota, or Alaska.

  Gun Retailers per 100k Residents

  AK	MT	WY	ND	VT	ID	SD	ME	NH	DE
  186	154	147	93	81	79	78	50	44	18

  [Source]

  Wyoming has the highest rate of gun shows, per-capita, in the U.S. Wyoming's rate is over twice as high as Idaho's and around seven times New Hampshire's. By absolute numbers, Wyoming has 50 gun shows per year compared to New Hampshire's 17 in 2000, Alaska's 4 in 2000, and California's 188 in 1999.

  Gun Shows per Year

  State	Population (2000)	Shows	Shows per 100K people
  WY	493,782	50	10.00
  MT	902,195	54	6.00
  ID	1,293,653	49	3.75
  SD	754,844	27	3.50
  DE	783,600	16	2.00
  NH	1,235,786	17	1.50
  ME	1,274,923	14	1.00
  ND	642,200	7	1.00
  AK	626,932	4	0.75
  VT	608,827	3	0.50

  [Source]

• Laws

  The people of Wyoming value their freedom; it is part of their culture. For the most part, the people of Wyoming tend to be some of the most individualistic people in the country.

  Wyoming has less of a need for the federal government than most states. It has no metropolises, no cesspools of crime, and no welfare ghettos that think of the government as the answer to every problem.

  Wyoming does not have a huge problem with farmers demanding aid from the federal government (unlike North Dakota, South Dakota, Montana, and Idaho).

  Even Wyoming's animals are free from the confines of a zoo. The entire state is a zoo! With wolves, cougars, bears, bison, bald eagles, and wild horses.

  Wyoming is already one of the most free, least restrictive states in the country. If we move to Wyoming, we will already be a few years ahead of where we would be in most of the other candidate states, as far as freedom is concerned.

  Other laws:

  • Wyoming is a right-to-work state (unlike Montana, New Hampshire, Delaware, Alaska, Maine, and Vermont).

  • Wyoming is one of the 15 states in the U.S. (five of them are FSP states) that allow most class C fireworks. New Hampshire and Idaho are more restrictive, while Vermont and Delaware outright ban fireworks.

  • Wyoming requires motorcycle helmets for children, but it does not require bicycle helmets like Delaware and parts of Montana.

  • Wyoming has some of the least restrictive window tinting laws in the country, whereas New Hampshire, Delaware, and Alaska are more restrictive.

  • Wyoming has the least restrictive smoking laws in the country, while all of the other FSP states are much more restrictive. Delaware has the most restrictive smoking laws in the country.

  • Wyoming, South Dakota, Idaho, and Montana have the least restrictive speed limit laws out of the candidate states. The interstate speed limits are generally 75 mph in the above states, but only 65 mph in New Hampshire, Alaska, and Delaware. [Source]. One former resident of Evanston WY, said that many of the cars traveling between Salt Lake City UT, and Evanston WY go 80-85 mph without fear of being ticketed.

  • Wyoming has no laws regarding extra-high minimum wages or living wages, unlike Vermont, Maine, and Montana.

  • Wyoming has no statewide land-use planning laws, unlike Idaho, New Hampshire, Maine, and Vermont.

• Report

  I did some research on both economic and social freedoms in all 50 states and produced a report based on the research. I used a total of 15 different easy-to-compare factors for the report. The report listed Wyoming, South Dakota, and Alaska, three of the least-populated states in the country, as the freest states in the country. The conclusion to the report stated, "The most free states in the country tend to be the western states with very low population density rates." Wyoming and Alaska are the farthest west, low population density states in the country.

• Resistance to Federal Government

  Wyoming openly and actively resists federal laws. Many of Wyoming's citizens believe that Wyoming law trumps federal law. Sometimes the state tries to resist or ignore federal laws, while other times, the state takes the federal government to court:

  1. Wolf case – The U.S. Department of Interior reintroduced wolves into northwest Wyoming in 1995. The wolves have caused so much damage and have grown in such numbers that they are no longer an endangered species. Wyoming passed two bills that guarantee that farmers and ranchers will be allowed to shoot wolves on sight, hunting of wolves will be encouraged, and the federal government will have to reimburse Wyoming for all damages caused by the wolves. The Wyoming legislature is sick of the federal government and resents the lack of foresight it demonstrated prior to reintroducing the wolves into Wyoming. See here and here

  2. Wyoming was the last state in the country to raise the minimum drinking age to 21 years of age and did not pass zero tolerance laws until 1998. Wyoming did not pass a law preventing drivers from drinking while they drive until 2001. However, this bill did not prevent passengers from drinking. This law is not in accordance with federal law, which states that the passengers cannot have open containers. Because Wyoming chose not to follow the federal mandate, it lost some of its federal highway funds. Here's how the states stack up:

     Minimum Drinking Age Set to 21

     WY	SD	MT	ID	VT	NH	ME	AK	DE	ND
     1988	1988	1987	1987	1986	1985	1985	1984	1984	1936

     Year of Zero Tolerance for Under 21

     WY	SD	VT	ND	AK	MT	DE	ID	NH	ME
     1998	1998	1997	1997	1996	1995	1995	1994	1993	1983

     [Source]

     For more information on the issue of drinking and driving in Wyoming read, why the West has resisted drunken-driving crackdown.

  3. County sheriff in charge - County sheriffs in Wyoming demanded that all federal law enforcement officers and personnel from federal regulatory agencies clear all their activities in a Wyoming county with the Sheriff's Office. In addition, Wyoming sheriffs demanded to see all of the BATF's and IRS' records relating to Wyoming. Wyoming took the federal government to court and won because it argued that the state was in charge based on the 10th Amendment to the United States Constitution. Sheriff Mattis, the main sheriff representing the Wyoming Sheriffs' Association, said, "I hope that more sheriffs all across America will join us in protecting their citizens from the illegal activities of the IRS, EPA, BATF, FBI, or any other federal agency that is operating outside the confines of constitutional law." The courts ruled," Wyoming is a sovereign state and the duly elected sheriff of a county is the highest law enforcement official within a county and has law enforcement powers exceeding that of any other state or federal official." See here, here, and here.

  4. Wyoming sued the federal government over control of its forests and won the case. The federal government wanted permanent and complete control over the federal forests in Wyoming. Wyoming knew that the federal government refused to actively manage forests and that this would hurt tourism, traveling, and lead to more and larger forest fires. See here.

  5. Even Wyoming's citizens sue the federal government. Wyoming's citizens have the right to sue the U.S. Bureau of Land Management. It was previously thought that the BLM was somewhat immune from lawsuits, just like the IRS used to be, but that is now changed because of one brave Wyoming man.

  6. Wyoming reads the federal fine print and is able to lead other states in fights against the federal government. Wyoming started a water rebellion when it read the fine print in a federal government water rights scheme. Wyoming noticed that the scheme would give the federal government final control over all government and private water in Wyoming, and the state knew that was unconstitutional. Wyoming was able to influence other state governments to join the water rebellion. In fact, both government and private organizations from various Western states joined together, to fight the federal government. See here and here.

  7. The federal government's National Park Service tried to prevent people from climbing Wyoming's famous Devils Tower during June. June is supposedly a sacred month to some of the Native American tribes from South Dakota. The Native American tribes and the National Park Service worked together to stop the climbing. The Nation Park Service called for a voluntary ban on all climbing during June. The Wyoming Friends of Devils Tower and the Mountain States Legal Foundation fought the action. The federal courts agreed, they ruled that the National Parks Service violated the First Amendment to the United States Constitution and Devils Tower National Monument's own management policies. The United States still means something in Wyoming because its people care about freedom. See here.

  8. Wyoming's State Supreme Court keeps state and local governments, and the press in check. Laramie tried to restrict newspapers, but the Wyoming State Supreme Court said that violated the First Amendment. The Wyoming Department of Health thought that it would help children by making it mandatory for them to get vaccinations. The Wyoming State Supreme Court found mandatory vaccinations unconstitutional. The Gillette News-Record wanted to release the names of concealed carry permit holders. The Wyoming State Supreme Court said that would violate the privacy of the permit holders. After all, open carry of firearms has always been legal in Wyoming. The only reason Wyoming passed concealed carry laws in the 1990s was so people could carry a firearm without other people knowing about it. In Wyoming, you are innocent until proven guilty and must be treated as such. See also here and here.

IV. Groups That Could Work Against Freedom

These groups include: the Green Party, labor unions, teacher unions, religious groups, and Native Americans.

1. The Green Party

   Ralph Nader, the Green Party presidential candidate for 2000, was not able to even get on the ballot in Wyoming. He could not get enough signatures to be on the ballot, even though the standards were not very strict. The Libertarian, Constitutional, Reform, and Natural Law parties were all able to get their presidential candidate on the ballot in Wyoming. This compares very favorably to many other of the FSP candidate states where Ralph Nader not only got on the ballot, but also won a substantial number of votes.

   Green Party voters in the 2000 presidential election

   WY	0	0%
   SD	0	0%
   ID	0	0%
   DE	8,288	3%	Almost half as much as the expected FSP membership
   ND	9,530	3%	Almost half as much as the expected FSP membership
   VT	19,810	7%	Almost as much as the expected FSP membership
   NH	22,156	4%	More than the expected FSP membership
   AK	22,789	10%	More than the expected FSP membership; 1 in 10 voters
   MT	24,487	6%	More than the expected FSP membership
   ME	37,842	6%	Almost double the expected FSP membership

   [Source]

2. Labor unions

   Labor union members form another group that might oppose increased freedom in the chosen state. A significant percentage of the budgets of labor unions are spent on contributions to the campaigns of statist politicians. According to the Labor Research organization, only New Hampshire and Wyoming resisted voting for a "big-labor"-supported candidate in the whole nation during the last election cycle. Of all 10 states, only Wyoming, South Dakota, North Dakota, and Idaho have right-to-work laws.

   Union membership rates tend to be less in right-to-work states, but the rates are also influenced by the presence of certain jobs which unions prefer to organize, as well as other factors:

   Labor Union Membership (in thousands)

   SD	WY	ND	VT	ID	DE	MT	AK	NH	ME
   19	20	21	30	42	45	48	59	60	72

   [Source]

   Would you rather have 20,000 union members oppose the FSP (like Wyoming), over twice as many (like Idaho and Montana), or over thrice as many (like New Hampshire and Maine)? If New Hampshire is picked, union membership will be three times as large as the FSP membership.

   Of course, this is not to say that all union members would oppose us. Some states' own set of circumstances could play into our hands, even with union members opposing us. It's just that given the track record of labor unions in this country (and how very few members opt-out of seeing their contributions going to support statist politicians), it might be desirable to have fewer union members in the chosen state. Even if the union members wanted to help the freedom movement, in the six states that are union controlled, including New Hampshire, union members would still be forced to fight against the freedom movement, with at least their union dues

3. Teacher unions

   On the FSP Forum, Joe Swyers said, "Total teacher numbers is a crucial factor for the FSP – just like total voter numbers. In Idaho, Maine, New Hampshire, and Montana, the teachers would outnumber the 20,000 Free State activists … Teachers, especially union teachers, are activists – if for no other reason than they daily reach a large number of students and their parents." Joe makes a compelling argument. Teacher unions routinely fight against: tax cuts, the liberalization of home school laws, any changes in school curricula, and any type of cutback in funding for government schools. Wyoming stands out as the only state the does not give teacher unions monopoly power or forced dues. Wyoming has the third-lowest percentage of NEA teachers, behind only South Dakota and Idaho. In addition, Wyoming has the smallest number of teachers and the smallest number of unionized teachers.

   Joe also categorized the 10 candidate states based on how much their laws restrict teacher unions. Restricting teacher unions is a good thing, and so the states listed first should be considered best, and the states listed last should be considered worst, for this criterion.

   % of K-12 employees in the NEA (2000)

   State	% in NEA	Teacher Monopoly Bargaining	Forced Dues
   WY	38	no	no
   SD	36	yes	no
   ID	38
   VT	51
   ME	53
   ND	64
   NH	41	yes	yes
   DE	60
   MT	66
   AK	74

   Sources: here and here. (States with less than 1,000 AFT "votes" were omitted from the source for AFT numbers).

4. Religious Groups

   Wyoming is the fifth least-religious state in America, and is likely the second least-religious candidate state, according to this report. In addition, Wyoming has much more religious diversity than most states.

   WY Religious Preferences

   No religion	20%
   Catholic	18%
   Christian	17%
   Baptist	9%
   Lutheran	9%
   Other	7%
   Latter-Day Saints	7%
   Methodist	5%
   Presbyterian	4%
   Episcopalian	4%

   Wyoming has better religious diversity than the nine other candidate states. If the major religions of one of the other candidate states stood united against freedom, we would have a very difficult time trying to help the state break free. That's why religious diversity is important. In a state like Wyoming, all of the religions would have to stand against us to have a substantial impact against the FSP, but in states like New Hampshire, Vermont, North Dakota, South Dakota, Maine, and Montana, just one or two major religions might be able to break the FSP.

   Religious Monopoly Control
   (% of state residents in the 3 major religions for that state)
   (Lower % is better)

   WY	36%	(18% Catholic, 9% Lutheran, 9% Baptist)
   ID	38%	(15% Catholic, 14% Latter-Day Saints*, 9% Baptist)
   MT	43%	(22% Catholic, 14% Lutheran, 7% Methodist)
   NH	47%	(35% Catholic, 6% Baptist, 6% Congregational)
   DE	48%	(20% Methodist, 19% Baptist, 9% Catholic)
   ME	48%	(24% Catholic, 15% Baptist, 9% Methodist)
   VT	50%	(38% Catholic, 6% Methodist, 6% Congregational)
   SD	65%	(27% Lutheran, 25% Catholic, 13% Methodist)
   ND	72%	(35% Lutheran, 30% Catholic, 7% Methodist)

   * The Mormon Church claims that 26% of those living in Idaho are LDS.
   [Source]. No data for AK.

   However, the Christian members of the FSP should not be afraid of moving to Wyoming. For example, K-Love, a national group of Christian radio stations from California, has five stations in Wyoming. Wyoming's religious groups can be broken down to different regions of the state, to some extent. The southwestern portion of Wyoming has the bulk of the state's Latter-Day Saints population. The least religious parts of Wyoming tend to be the mining towns, and the college town of Laramie.

5. Native Americans

   Wyoming has one Indian reservation – the Wind River Indian Reservation. Most of the reservation is in Fremont County (whose largest city is Riverton). However, most of the people in Riverton are not Native Americans. Native Americans, both on and off the reservation, make up 2.3% of Wyoming's population and represent the second-largest minority group in Wyoming. (The largest minority group in Wyoming is Hispanics at 3.2% to 6.4% of the population, depending on how you define Hispanic).

   Native American population %

   NH	VT	DE	ME	ID	WY	ND	MT	SD	AK
   < 1	< 1	< 1	< 1	1.4	2.3	4.9	6.2	8.3	15.6

   [Source]

   When compared to Wyoming, the other western and mid-western states have both more Indian Reservations and a larger Native American population. Native Americans might work for, against, or indifferent to the principles of the FSP. Many Native Americans are unemployed and rely on government subsidies. However, because they are unemployed they have plenty of free time to be activists. If the FSP members are able to convince the Native American population of Wyoming, or any other states, that we are on their side, there could be thousands of new freedom activists!

V. Miscellaneous Factors

Miscellaneous factors include such things as: pro-business environment, climate and weather, livability, friendliness, gambling, private schools, jobs, "firsts", and location.

1. Pro-Business Environment

   According to the 1999 Economic Freedom Index which ranks all 50 states, Wyoming has more economic freedom than eight of the other candidate states. The Index ranks Wyoming better than New Hampshire, Delaware, Montana, and Alaska:

   Economic Freedom Index (1-50)

   ID	WY	SD	NH	DE	ND	MT	VT	AK	ME
   1	4	5	6	7	21	26	34	38	42

   The 2002 Small Business Survival Index ranks Wyoming as the third-best state for small businesses in the entire country. Wyoming bests such states as Florida, New Hampshire, Texas, and Delaware. The candidate states of Idaho, North Dakota, Montana, Vermont, and Maine are all ranked as part of the worst 25 states in the country for small businesses.

   Expansion Management Magazine ranked Cheyenne as a Five Star Community for quality of life. (These rankings were done so that small to mid-sized companies would have a basis to compare different cities for relocation purposes).

   Many people have companies that are financial, electronic, or mail order related. No matter which state is picked, the profits of these companies will not change much. However, the dollars made from the company will mean less in Alaska or New Hampshire than they will mean in Wyoming, because of its low cost of living. Likewise, if one of these companies moves from New Hampshire or Delaware to Wyoming, the dollars will be worth more and the company owner will be able to help the FSP out to a greater degree. Most business owners prefer a general sales tax, like Wyoming has, to personal and corporate income taxes, like New Hampshire, Idaho, Montana, Alaska, and Vermont have. Businesses find that sales taxes are easier to comply with than personal and corporate income taxes. This is because sales taxes are straightforward and easy to understand, unlike corporate tax laws.

   According to the Fiduciary Group, Delaware and Wyoming are the only two candidate states that have a worldwide reputation for being business-friendly. (See the Fiduciary Group's report on Wyoming). According to a report by CRA of America, Wyoming might be a better state for LLCs than either Nevada or Delaware. In 1977, Wyoming became the first state to authorize Limited Liability Corporations. Wyoming has some of the most liberal LLC laws in the country, and continues to attract both national and international companies.

   Wyoming is much less regulated than most states. Wyoming has many advantages for companies (in addition to being personal and corporate income tax free). You do not even have to get a business license in many parts of Wyoming. For example, Johnson County (with its towns of Buffalo and Kaycee) has no business license requirements. Although the state of Wyoming just created a standard set of building codes (the Universal Building Codes standard), many of Wyoming's counties do not have any laws relating to the UBC standard and do not enforce the state law. The northeastern states, especially New Hampshire and Maine, have many 19th century farmhouses. Many people want to see these houses preserved even if it means that property owners cannot renovate the houses, as they see fit. Environmental regulations are hurting the mining business in Montana, the fishery and logging businesses in Maine, and even the housing market in Vermont.

2. Livability and Crime

   Out of the 10 candidate states, Wyoming has the second-highest livability ranking. In fact, according to a 2002 report by Morgan Quitno Press, Wyoming is the eighth-most livable state in the country. The report also claims that Wyoming has the sixth-lowest crime rate in the country. Wyoming helps prove the libertarian point the private prisons do not automatically mean high crime because Wyoming is a very low crime state.

   Percent of prison population in private prisons:
   Alaska, 33.5%
   Idaho, 23.9%
   Wyoming, 21.3%
   North Dakota, 5.1%
   Montana, 3.4%
   South Dakota, 1.7%
   Maine, 0.6%
   Delaware, New Hampshire, and Vermont, 0%

   Livability Ranking

   State:	NH	WY	SD	ME	ND	VT	DE	ID	AK	MT
   Rank:	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10

   [Source]

3. Friendliness

   Wyoming is a friendly and welcoming place to outsiders. Several million people travel to Wyoming on a yearly basis. These tourists spend money in Wyoming and help support Wyoming's economy. Wyoming's tourists come from all walks of life and have made Wyoming's residents accustomed to interacting with all types of people. Most people that live in Wyoming are not even from Wyoming. In fact, only 42.5% of Wyoming's population is native, making it the second-best candidate state for that factor. Wyoming is far enough west that people do not care about the North-South division that is more prevalent in the East. Wyoming welcomes both Northerners and Southerners.

4. Private Schools

   Wyoming has the third-highest percentage of children enrolled in private schools. According to the following report, the percent of children in Wyoming's private schools is around 250% higher than New Hampshire's.

   % of School-Age Pop. in Private Schools (Elementary and Secondary)

   ME	ID	WY	DE	MT	AK	SD	ND	NH	VT
   16.2	14.6	14.3	12.6	11.8	9.4	7.7	5.5	4.1	2.0

   [Source] 1994 (sorry, latest figures I have)

   After looking at the above report, a Porcupine gave the following insightful observations on the FSP Forum: "States like Wyoming have a political disadvantage over states like Delaware. In Delaware, everyone in Wilmington who can afford to do so sends their kids to private school because of the center for drugs and violence that some of those big city public schools have become (or at least are perceived to be). Whereas, Wyoming schools seem clean and safe, and even some of the richest families send their children to public schools."

5. Jobs

   Wyoming is expected to produce fewer jobs in the next 10 years than any of the other candidate states. This topic bears extended discussion.

   • Wyoming's past and future growth

     According to the 2000 Census, Wyoming's population grew from 453,588 residents in 1990 to 493,782 in 2000. This means that Wyoming was able to handle 40,194 new residents in 10 years. Currently, Wyoming has a lower than average unemployment rate, which means that all of the people who moved to Wyoming in the 1990s were able to find jobs. Wyoming's per-capita income is growing much faster than the nation as a whole, and has progressed from 36th in the nation (1996) to 28th in the nation (2000) and is currently 20th in the nation (2001).

     Cheyenne WY is the northernmost city in the Rocky Mountain's Front Range region. This region has around 2.5 million people, many high-tech companies, and good transportation lines. Over time, more and more Colorado companies are moving to Wyoming. They choose Wyoming because of its low crime and very low taxes. If the FSP is able to prove to these companies that we are a pro-business organization and have a skilled workforce, then we will be able to attract even more companies to Wyoming.

   • Out-of-state jobs

     Wyoming is better positioned than most states, including all of the western states, for out-of-state jobs. Wyoming should have enough jobs for the FSP, by itself. However, some members may want very specialized jobs that are not available in relatively small MSAs, like Cheyenne WY. Ft. Collins CO, for example, is larger than Billings MT, and is only 40 miles from Wyoming. Wyoming is close to both the Salt Lake City/Park City/Ogden and the Ft. Collins/Longmont/Denver areas. Wyoming is even closer to Montana's largest population area, Billings, than almost all of Montana itself is. Wyoming is less than one and a half hours from Billings, MT. Parts of western Wyoming are much closer to two of Idaho's four largest cities than almost all of Idaho is. Even the Black Hills region of Wyoming is not isolated. In fact it is closer to the second-largest MSA, and entertainment center, of South Dakota than almost all of South Dakota is. Also, Wyoming is only 30 minutes away from the largest city in western Nebraska – Scottsbluff.

     All of these cities and metro centers offer some jobs that may require only a few days per week of actual in-office work. Pilots, marketers, advertisers, investors, writers, healthcare professionals, truck drivers, telecommuters, and franchise expanders will have no trouble finding work in these out-of-state cities. It should be noted, that all of these jobs are available in Wyoming, as well.

     Front-range MSAs near Wyoming:

     • Ft Collins/Loveland - distance 40 miles, population 260,000+
     • Greeley - distance 63 miles, population 200,000+
     • Longmont/Boulder - distance 71 miles, population 300,000+
     • Denver - distance 94 miles, population 2,200,000+
     • All of the above - population 3,000,000+
     • All of the above - 2025 projected population 5,000,000+

     More statistics on Ft. Collins MSA from the Northern Colorado Economic Development Council:

     • The Ft. Collins MSA is one of the 10 fastest growing MSAs in the country
     • The Ft. Collins MSA expects 215,000 new jobs between 1997 and 2010
     • ? Median Income is $58,200
     • ? Major Employers: Colorado State University, ConAgra Beef, Hewlett-Packard, Agilent Technologies, Poudre Valley Health Systems, Eastman Kodak, Wal-Mart, State Farm Insurance, StarTek, Inc., Woodward, Advanced Energy, Teledyne WaterPik, McKee Medical Center, Anheuser-Busch, and Celestica

   • Job growth

     Let us consider the notion of "more jobs is better" (the assumption made in the spreadsheet concerning the Jobs variable). We can make a list of advantages and disadvantages of a high-growth state and a low-growth state:

     High job-growth state:

     1. More jobs might mean the state is probably already experiencing heavy immigration, which may lead to hostility towards newcomers. Add to that a political agenda, and we may have a difficult time in the area of acceptance.

     2. More jobs might mean the economy in the state is already healthy. This means FSP influence will be harder to prove in "turning things around", thus making the Free State model less attractive to other states. FSP may thus be a "one-state wonder."

     3. More jobs, above the needs of FSP and Friends-of-FSP, will draw economic refugees from other states. These will dilute FSP efforts to free the states, particularly if the refugees are from nearby statist states that are exporting jobs due to poor economic policies.

     4. More jobs means a fast-increasing population, so FSP may have difficulty staying on top of things, and may find itself more in a defensive role, rather than making progress in increasing freedom.

     5. More jobs might mean the choice in places to live would be wider, although jobs do tend to be concentrated in larger cities.

     6. More jobs might mean easier access to occupations for FSP members who are not retirees.

     Low job-growth state:
     1. Fewer jobs, especially at the lowest levels, will effectively shut off all statist immigration for the period that FSP members are immigrating to the state. This will give us time to get up-to-speed politically, and start influencing things – particularly in the area of providing other disincentives for statists to move to the state, which will be needed as FSP policies gradually improve the economic picture.

     2. Fewer jobs might mean the economy is flat. Thus, we should be able to subsequently make a convincing demonstration of the benefits of freedom to the economy. This demonstration will help spread freedom to neighboring states, particularly those that are languishing.

     3. Fewer jobs might mean more difficult access to occupations for FSP members who are not retirees (the retirees should have no problem). It will take more years for all our member-population to move to the state. However, uniquely in Wyoming's case, its status as the default backup state (in case FSP fails to reach 20,000) means members can start moving there immediately after the vote is taken, so members will have more years to immigrate to Wyoming.

     4. Fewer jobs might mean that more FSP members will have to go to tech or vocation school to learn a new skill.

     5. Fewer jobs might mean that more FSP members might want to travel out of state for a job. (Wyoming is one of the best candidate states for this. The Ft. Collins MSA starts only forty minutes from Cheyenne and expects 215,000 new jobs between 1997 and 2010.)

     A further factor to this equation is that it will become generally known that a large block of business-friendly people will be moving to the chosen state. In addition, this block of people will have diverse skills. These facts might make corporations reconsider Wyoming in a new and positive light, for location of new facilities.

     The above shows that, far from being an unalloyed good, a high jobs number serves to ease initial FSP entry into the state, while likely making things more difficult for us, later on. For that reason, in the large FSP comparison spreadsheet, Paul Bonneau pegged an intermediate number of jobs (60,000) as ideal for the FSP, rather than just using it as a simple "more is better" measure, as Jason did on the regular spreadsheet.

6. Wyoming Firsts

   Wyoming is a trend setting state and the first state in the nation in several different categories. I am not sure how important this factor is; certainly, it is not as important as the first five factors I discussed in this report. However, this factor was brought up on the FSP Forum, when it was mentioned that New Hampshire has the earliest, or first, primary in the nation. This is true, although any state, at any time, can change when it has its election primary. Wyoming has an impressive list of firsts, itself. Some of these may be good while others might be looked at as bad, but one thing is for sure, these trends did catch on in the rest of the country. Many people think that the FSP might spread to other states, in much the same way that Wyoming's firsts have.

   Wyoming's Firsts:

   • First state to allow women to vote
   • First woman Justice of the Peace
   • First all woman jury
   • First woman bailiff
   • First woman elected to a statewide office (Superintendent)
   • First woman governor
   • First town to be governed entirely by women
   • First national park
   • First ranger station
   • First national monument (Devil's Tower)
   • First national forest
   • First American rodeo
   • First state to allow limited liability corporations

     [Source]

7. Location

   Wyoming is centrally located between the northwestern, southwestern, and mid-western states. Because of this, Wyoming's interstate roads travel from Canada to Mexico and through New York City, Chicago, Omaha, Salt Lake City, and San Francisco. Wyoming is located less than two hours from large airline hubs in Salt Lake City and Denver. Wyoming is surrounded by the low-population, liberty-friendly states of South Dakota, Montana, and Idaho. When the FSP is successful in Wyoming, any of these candidate states would make a good second state to liberate.

   Wyoming is one of only two FSP candidate states which does not share a border with Canada. Some people have tried to claim this is a strike against Wyoming. However, I feel that this factor is a plus for Wyoming. Having a border with Canada gives the federal government more Constitutional power in a state. Especially now, with the Homeland Security Department, a growing international terrorist threat, US Patriot Acts I and II, and increased border controls, having a Canadian border could be a hindrance to a candidate state.

   Kelton, a fellow Porcupine, published a series of very interesting articles dealing with land-locked states, border security, and economic freedom of neighboring states. After the articles, he summed up the articles with the conclusion: "The Myth has been debunked! 1) A border with Canada is a potential liability. 2) A long coastline is not necessary or even desirable for a free state to exist."

   Even if all of the problems the U.S. government might bring on a Canadian-bordered Free State are ignored, it should be noted, that the Canadian government would likely be against the Free State. The Canadian central government is anti-freedom, in general. It is against many of the things the FSP member love, like guns. Even the provincial governments are against freedom. According to Economic Freedom in North America, all of the Canadian providences, except for one, have less economic freedom than even the least-free American state. Canada might try to blame all of its future crime, gun, drug, and moral problems on the Free State. These issues were discussed in detail on the FSP Forum thread titled, Border with Canada? Bad Idea. Canadian Government is not a friend.

VI. Conclusion

• Comparison Spreadsheets

  Both Jason and Paul Bonneau made spreadsheets that compare the FSP candidate states on various factors. Jason tried to limit his spreadsheet to the factors that he thought were most important for the FSP members to consider. Paul's spreadsheet includes many of the same factors. Additionally, he added a large number of useful but less important factors to the spreadsheet. Both spreadsheets place Wyoming well ahead of the rest of the states.

• State-by-state Comparisons
  • Wyoming vs. Alaska

    Some of the FSP members feel Alaska is the best state. However, in my opinion, Wyoming surpasses Alaska. Wyoming is located near the center of the country, whereas Alaska is almost a week's drive from the lower 48. The groups that would oppose the FSP are more powerful in Alaska. It has a larger percentage and amount of government, labor union, teacher union, Native American, and Green Party members than Wyoming. Alaska is the coldest and most isolated of the candidate states, whereas Wyoming is the third-warmest and is very close to two major metropolitan centers. Alaska has more opt-outs than any other state and is likely to lose many more people after the first winter, than Wyoming is. Alaska has a much higher percentage of people receiving government assistance than Wyoming. Alaska has a reputation for attracting criminals and is the ninth-highest violent crime rate in the country, whereas Wyoming is one of the safest states in the country.

    Campaigning would be very hard during Alaska's cold season because: the daylight hours are very short, much of Alaska is to cold to go outside (for many people), and it literally takes four to five days to drive from Alaska's largest city to its capitol city. Out of all the low population states, Alaska has the largest state legislative districts. This is because Alaska only has 40 members in its state house and 20 members in its state senate. This compares very poorly to Wyoming, which has the second-smallest state legislative districts in the county. In addition, Alaska has a large budget deficit problem, whereas Wyoming is the only candidate state that does not have a budget problem.

  • Wyoming vs. South Dakota

    Some of the FSP members have suggested that South Dakota is the best compromise state for the FSP project. While this is an interesting point, I believe that Wyoming actually is the best compromise state. South Dakota is very dependent on farming and the federal subsidies that come with it. Wyoming is near two major metropolitan centers but South Dakota is not near any. Wyoming has better religious diversity than any of the candidate states, but in South Dakota the combined numbers of Lutherans, Catholics, and Methodists make up 65% of the population. Wyoming has a very low native-born population while South Dakota has the second-highest native-born population. Wyoming has warm areas spread all across the state, but the only remotely warm part of South Dakota is in one section of the Black Hills. Wyoming has both windy and non-windy areas while all of South Dakota is quite windy. Wyoming has mountains, hills, and valleys, but almost all of South Dakota is very flat.

  • Wyoming vs. Montana

    In many ways, the same group of FSP members is attracted to both Montana and Wyoming. However, Wyoming has many advantages over Montana. Wyoming's population is much more likely to vote for small-government candidates for President, and its citizen's ideology is more pro-freedom. Montana has much stronger opposition groups in the way of stronger labor union (because of no right-to-work laws), teacher union, Green Party, and Native American groups. Montana has a big problem with liberals from California moving to the entire western part of the state; as opposed to Wyoming, where California liberals are only moving to Jackson Hole. Montana's farmers are very dependent on the federal government; and many of the people are on welfare. Montana has a large border with Canada, which opens it up to all types of homeland security, border control, and terrorist prevention laws and federal regulations. Montana has the lowest mean household income in the country, whereas Wyoming's is more in line with the national average. Montana is heavily regulated with parts of it having bicycle helmet and living wage laws, unlike Wyoming, which does not have such laws. One Porcupine even said that they think of Montana as, "the Maine of the West." In fact, in Wyoming, many places do not even have business licenses or building code laws. Wyoming has lower property taxes than Montana and also has no income or corporate taxes.

  • Wyoming vs. New Hampshire

    Although New Hampshire is better for the FSP than some states, it does not seem to compare favorably to Wyoming. For starters, Wyoming's population is only 39% as large as New Hampshire's. Wyoming has inexpensive elections at $4,700,000, whereas New Hampshire has the most expensive elections, at a whopping $19,600,000. If these numbers hold, the FSP members will have to come up with well over four times as much money to run campaigns as successfully in New Hampshire than in Wyoming. New Hampshire has a very low estimated rate of gun ownership, at only 36%. Wyoming, on the other hand, has the highest estimated rate of gun ownership in the country at 88%. In addition, Wyoming has 10 gun shows for every 100,000 people, whereas New Hampshire has only 1.5. New Hampshire has large state legislative districts (especially senate) and no term limits or ballot imitative processes, while Wyoming is just the opposite. New Hampshire is not a right-to-work state, and because of this, it has both a large number of members in both labor and teacher unions.

    New Hampshire is surrounded by very statists states (Maine, Vermont, Massachusetts, New York, Connecticut, Rhode Island and Providence Plantation, and Canada), while Wyoming is surrounded by many liberty-friendly states (Montana, South Dakota, Idaho, Colorado, and Nevada). This means that if New Hampshire was picked it would likely attract the few freedom activists that are left in its surrounding states. This would leave the freedom movements of the surrounding states in even worse shape and prevent the FSP from expanding into New Hampshire's neighboring states. However, something even worse is already happening in New Hampshire: statists from Boston are moving to New Hampshire at an alarming rate. This growth is expected to increase, and even more so if the FSP selects New Hampshire and de-regulates business laws.

  • Wyoming vs. Idaho

    Even though some people consider Idaho a superior candidate state over New Hampshire, this does not necessarily mean that Idaho is superior to Wyoming. Wyoming has several very important, distinct advantages over Idaho. Idaho's current population is over 2.68 times the size of Wyoming's, and is expected to grow so fast that it will soon be three times. This is a major concern, because it could indicate that Idaho needs three times as many committed and dedicated freedom activists as Wyoming, in order for the entire project to be a success. Wyoming's state house and senate districts are much smaller than Idaho's. Wyoming's districts are 8,230 and 16,000 people, while Idaho's are 36,962 and over 38,300, respectively. Wyoming does not tax personal or corporate income, and it has low property tax rates. On the other hand, Idaho taxes its citizens every which way it can, including personal income, corporate income, sales, and property taxes. Idaho has a very large and powerful Latter-Day Saints contingent that is whole-heartedly against such trivial activities as smoking, drinking, and using products that contain caffeine. The Mormon population of Idaho is estimated at being anywhere from 14% to 26% of the state's entire religious population. In Wyoming, on the other hand, as one Porcupine said, people just want to be left alone.

  • Wyoming vs. other low population states

    Wyoming stands out as the best low population state. Wyoming is in a class of its own, as far as population is concerned. Many people consider South Dakota and Delaware to be low population states, but their respective populations are over 50% larger than Wyoming's. Even though Alaska and Delaware are low population states, their state legislative districts are very large, whereas Wyoming has the second-smallest district sizes in the country. Wyoming voters were more likely to vote for a small government candidate during the 2000 presidential election than voters from any other state, including all of the low population states. In addition, the ideology of Wyoming's citizens is more pro-freedom than every low population state except for Alaska. In fact, the ideology of Wyoming's citizens is, figuratively, light years ahead of Vermont, Delaware, and North Dakota. Wyoming is not very dependent on federal subsidies, unlike North Dakota, South Dakota, and Alaska. Out of all low population states, Wyoming has the second best weather. In fact, the weather is so bad in Alaska, North Dakota, and many parts of South Dakota, that many of the FSP members might abandon one of those states after their first winter there.

  • Wyoming vs. other western states

    There are many reasons to believe that Wyoming is the best western state for the FSP. Wyoming, Montana, Idaho, and Alaska are the four western states the FSP is considering. Wyoming's population is anywhere from 140,000 to 842,428 less than any of the other western states. Wyoming has fewer labor union and teacher union members than any of the other western states, which means less opposition to the principles of freedom. Wyoming does not have a Green Party movement, unlike Alaska and Montana, which have both a strong, growing Green Party, and other pro-regulation, environmental groups. Wyoming receives less federal aid than any other western state. Wyoming has a higher mean household income than any of the other western states, except for Alaska (which has a very high cost of living). The state house and senate districts are smaller in Wyoming than in any of the other western states, and they are much smaller than in all of the western states, except for Montana. The city governments in Wyoming are smaller and impose fewer regulations than the city governments of all other western FSP candidate states. Wyoming is the least isolated western state; it is closer to major metropolitan centers than any of the other western states.

• Key Wyoming Benefits
  • Best
    • Smallest number of people, registered voters, and actual voters
    • Smallest number of teachers and unionized teachers
    • Highest vote for small government candidates
    • Highest percentage of gun ownership and gun shows
    • Only FSP candidate state without a budget deficit
    • Most libertarian members of Congress

  • 2nd Best
    • 2nd lowest percentage of native residents
    • 2nd highest livability ranking
    • 2nd most economic freedom
    • 2nd lowest number of labor union members
    • 2nd smallest state legislative district size
    • 2nd most centrally located state

  • 3rd Best
    • 3rd least expensive elections
    • 3rd most freedom-friendly citizen ideology
    • 3rd best gun laws (and 1st in hunting laws)
    • 3rd warmest winters

  • Other
    • Near two major metropolitan centers (Denver, Salt Lake City)
    • Western individualist culture
    • State government actively resists the federal government
    • Very low taxes (no income, capital gains, or death taxes; lowest property taxes)
    • No US/Canadian border federal regulation/homeland security issues
    • Internationally recognized for very liberal limited liability corporation laws
    • No Green Party or socialist presence
    • High speed limits and few police
    • Excellent outdoor recreational opportunities
    • Two wonders of the world: Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons

• More information
  • Wyoming Links
  • Pictures
  • Outdoor Recreation
  • Selected Newspaper Articles
  • A Comparison of Wyoming's Climate to That of Other States

State Report WY 1: Wyoming Report for the Free State Project

Wyoming Report

by Greg Garber and Peter Saint-Andre

People

As anywhere, there are all sorts, but nowhere are extremes of personality more evident and tolerated. A democracy of people who are all individuals, rather than all just equal... The archetypical Wyoming citizen is characterized by the various meanings of the word "ornery." This can mean obstinate, cantankerous, obstructionist, resentful and revengeful, or independent, individualistic, non-conformist, and strong-minded. Even in the late twentieth century, specimens of this character abound outside the radius of Better Business bureaus.

In any case, this orneriness is usually covered with a somewhat superficial facade of smiling politeness, or even joviality. Over the years, outsiders (particularly Easterners used to the snarls of city dwellers), have fallen in love with the good, sweet, innocent lovable, open-handed sons and daughters of the West, only to find out later that there's hard rock underneath. Things like loyalty, respect, consideration, and instant handy response to emergencies and disaster are embedded in the rock, too. Just don't believe everything a citizen tells you.

Wyoming by Nathaniel Burt, pp. 15, 18

This is also a pretty good description of the typical Porcupine.

Self-Reliance

Wyoming's government sector is a bit larger than one would desire. 22% of the populace works for federal, state, or local governments (compared to less than 14% for DE and NH, 18.5% for ND, 20% for MT, and 30% for AK). However, Wyoming is less dependent ($1.14 received for every $1.00 paid in federal taxes) on the federal government than ND ($1.95), MT ($1.67), or AK ($1.63); although this does not compare favorably with DE ($0.86) or NH ($0.71). To some extent these numbers may be skewed by the presence of BLM employees and other federal workers, although they are slightly worrisome. However, in another measure of self-reliance, only 0.2% of Wyoming residents were on welfare as of the year 2000; this compares to NH 1.1%, ND 1.2%, MT 1.5%, DE 2.2%, and AK 3.9% (source: www.acf.dhhs.gov/news/stats/caseload.htm).

Politics

In the 2000 general election, a presidential year, Wyoming cast 221,685 ballots. In the 2002 general election, Wyoming's 496,000 people cast only 188,028 ballots.

2000 Presidential Election
Candidate	Votes
Gore (D)	60,481
Phillips (I)	720
Browne (L)	1,443
Hagelin (N)	411
Buchanan (Ref)	2,724
Bush (R)	147,947

Tennyson's analysis shows that Wyoming has both the greatest percentage of small government voters and the least number of big government voters. In the 2000 election, 60,908 votes were for big government candidates, while two and half times more votes (152,851) went for small government candidates. The only other state which comes close to favoring small government to this extent is Idaho. A potential problem for Idaho is if it's large voting aged population decided it didn't like porcupines, we would have little ability to compete. Tennyson's analysis suggests this is only a remote possibility, but Wyoming is even less risky.

In a typical election year, approximately 200,000 ballots are cast in Wyoming, which would mean a porcupine to native ratio of 1:10. Roughly speaking, this means each porcupine would only need to convince 5 natives to vote our way. Using figures from the 2000 election the ratios for all states would look like this:

Porcupine to Native Ratios
State	Voter Turnout	Voting Age Population
ME	1:33	1:49
AK	1:14	1:22
VT	1:15	1:23
NH	1:29	1:46
MT	1:21	1:34
ND	1:15	1:24
SD	1:16	1:28
DE	1:17	1:30
ID	1:25	1:47
WY	1:11	1:18

When voter turnout or voting age population and the native propensity to vote for small government candidates are considered, Wyoming is the clear winner.

The Wyoming Legislature meets for 60 days every other year and for a 30 day budget session in off years. Politics is not a full time occupation in the Wyoming Legislature. They hold real jobs such as house wives, mechanics, and college professors. Since they live in the real world, they would probably be more sympathetic to our cause than professional politicians.

The number of House and Senate members is proportional to the population of the counties. According to one estimate most of the political power comes from the Cheyenne, Laramie, and Casper areas.

Wyoming Constitution
2002 Wyoming Statutes
TOPICAL INDEX OF RESOLUTIONS AND MEMORIALS
2002 General Election Results
1998 and 2000

Town and Country

Measures of how urban states are vary widely, and can be misleading (e.g., New Jersey, the most densely populated state in the country, is made up mostly of many small but dense and densely-packed towns rather than one large metropolis). Wyoming's average population density is around 5 people per square mile -- more than Alaska's 1, comparable to MT's 6, less than the 10 or so in the Dakotas, and way less than 140 in NH or 400 in DE. Yet by some measures Wyoming is 65% urban! However, Wyoming is not urban in the way that, say, New Castle county, Delaware, is -- this county contains 440,000 people (only 50,000 fewer people than live in all of Wyoming!), most of them in or near Wilmington. The largest towns in Wyoming are Cheyenne and Casper at around 50,000 people each. From there the population of Wyoming towns drops off dramatically -- in fact, fewer than 20 towns in Wyoming have a population greater than 5,000 people, and only 5 (Cheyenne, Casper, Laramie, Gillette, and Rock Springs) have more than 15,000 people.

Half of Wyoming's population lives in the fourteen most populated towns. These are the cities of: Cheyenne, Casper, Laramie, Rock Springs, Gillette, Sheridan, Green River, Evanston, Rawlins, Riverton, Cody, Lander, Worland and Torrington. The first two cities account for 1/5 of the population; The first 3 account for 1/4 of the population and the first 4 account for 1/3 of Wyoming's population. In all 71% of Wyoming's population lives in it's 109 cities as of 1996. Outside of city limits population density drops to 0.69 people per square mile, or 1.46 square miles per person. Half the population lives in the counties of Laramie, Natrona, Sweetwater, Fremont, and Campbell, 5 out of 23 counties.

Acceptance of Outsiders

Of the states under consideration, only Alaska has a higher percentage of residents who were born out of state. Wyoming is comparable in this regard to New Hampshire, and compares quite favorably with places like Maine and the Dakotas (which have a much higher percentage of native-born people, and thus are not as open to outsiders). The relatively high percentage of non-natives in Wyoming bodes well for acceptance of porcupines and for their ability to make a difference.

Economy

The Wyoming economy is a perennial underperformer. The reason may be that it is heavily dependent on natural resource extraction (especially coal and natural gas). Also, it is quite far from major markets and transportation links are less than ideal. In addition, it's perceived by younger people as boring, which is why so many of them leave Wyoming for places like Denver. The ability of porcupines to find or create jobs in Wyoming will be an important factor in the decision process.

Historically, Wyoming's economy has grown in a series of booms. The peak of the most recent such boom occurred in 1981. Since then it's economy has diversified in service and manufacturing jobs.

Wyoming's economy has diversified since the boom and throughout the period of the 1990s. This may help buffer Wyoming against economic ups and downs in any particular industry. However, increased diversity for Wyoming, as currently constituted, appears to be consistent with lower wages. The question is whether Wyoming's economy can continue to diversify without negatively impacting wages further. The answer is yes, provided growth is encouraged in industries which, like mining, offer higher wages. To this end, the State and its communities may want to consider attracting Manufacturing and/or high-wage Services firms into Wyoming. Of course, our ability to do this rests on many factors, including our ability to provide the labor and satisfy employers' needs with respect to the quality of that labor.

Is Wyoming's Economy Diversifying and Is Economic Diversity in Wyoming Desirable?
by: Mark A. Harris, Sociologist, Ph.D.

That said, Wyoming's per capita personal income ranked 20th in the US at 97% of the national average. It increased 5.9% from 2000 to 2001 while the national average was only 2.4%.

The average cost of a 3 bedroom house in Laramie is $110,000. Housing sales range between $70,000-$510,000. Homes for sale spend an average of 100 days on market. Average apartment rental is $300-$600/month. Average home rental is $600-$850/month. The images below show Wyoming's per capita income, median household income, and median home value relative to the rest of the country.

Death and Taxes

 

Wyoming does not have a state personal or corporate income tax. It is the only state under consideration by the FSP that does not have a corporate income tax. The sales tax is 4%. Counties may add to sales tax, for instance in Albany County the total sales tax is 6%. According to the October 1998 issue of Kiplinger's Personal Finance Magazine Wyoming ranked lowest of the 50 states in total tax burden.

A June 2000 survey by the Wyoming Taxpayers Association found that the state's residential property tax rate of 0.753 percent of market value compares favorably to an average of 1.4 percent for surrounding states and 1.2 percent to 1.5 percent average tax rate for all states, depending on the price of the home. Nominal property tax rates, or mill levies, vary widely among the over 400 separate government bodies in Wyoming that levy property tax. (From Bankrate.com .)

State Tax Info at Bankrate.com
Economic Atlas
Current Job Offerings
BEARFACTS

History & Physical Environment

Wyoming is not Florida. It's high and dry, often windy, temperate in the summer, and cold in the winter. However, it's usually sunny, which helps quite a bit. As noted, the local climate varies somewhat depending on elevation, so that low-elevation towns like Lander are generally warmer and more temperate than high-elevation towns like Laramie.

Wyoming is landlocked. It is bordered by South Dakota and Nebraska on the east, Colorado on the south, Utah on the south and west, Idaho on the west, and Montana on the north. Personally I'm not convinced that this puts Wyoming at a disadvantage with respect to any other state in the lower 48, other than perhaps Maine (which shares a border with only one other state). Alaska is the only state that is superior in this regard, since it is not contiguous with the rest of the states.

Wyoming is a big state and much of it can be described only as empty. Partly this is because the environment is fairly harsh -- much of the state is high plains desert. Elevation has a large impact on the local climate, which is why towns like Riverton and Lander (elevation 5350 ft.) are more temperate than, say, Laramie (elevation 7165). Towns along the front range of the Rockies (e.g., Cheyenne and Casper) tend to be windy a lot of the time. This is less true in the western part of the state (e.g., Jackson and Evanston), which also receives more precipitation. Wyoming is not as densely mountainous as Colorado. The mountain ranges in Wyoming (e.g., the Snowies, Big Horns, Wind Rivers, Tetons, and Absarokas) tend to be separated by large stretches of relatively flat terrain with smaller mountains interspersed. These flatlands tend to be sparsely populated; one can often drive for 50 or 100 miles or more and pass through only a village or two. And because most of these flatlands are dominated by sagebrush, with trees being found only on the mountain slopes, one can often see for 100 miles in any direction. Truly a land of wide open spaces.

Weather is probably the last thing we should consider when choosing a state for our project. However since people often bring it up, here's the low down.

Name	State	Latitude	Longitude	Elevation(m)
KEENE/DILLANT(AWOS)	NH	42.90	-72.26	149
FARGO HECTOR I AP	ND	46.93	-96.81	274
GILLETTE (AMOS)	WY	44.35	-105.53	1230
MISSOULA INTERNATIO	MT	46.91	-114.10	972
MONTPELIER AP	VT	44.20	-72.56	343
LEWISTON NEZ PERCE	ID	46.36	-117.01	437
BANGOR AIRPORT	ME	44.80	-68.81	56
SIOUX FALLS FOSS FI	SD	43.58	-96.75	433
DOVER AFB	DE	39.13	-75.46	7

Monthly Median of Daily Mean Temperatures (degrees F)
Month	Keene NH	Fargo ND	Gillette WY	Missoula MT	Montpelier VT	Lewiston ID	Bangor ME	Sioux Falls SD	Dover DE	Anchorage AK
January	20.1	9.7	26.8	27.9	14.4	35.2	18.1	17.1	29.9	14.9
February	27.9	18.6	33.2	30.9	22.9	39.7	20.7	28	37.3	27.5
March	38	36.6	38.2	38.9	36.1	44.2	35.8	39.3	48.8	30.9
April	43.75	41.4	45.3	45.85	38.1	54.95	41.55	45.65	50.65	38.7
May	56.2	57.1	53.2	54	52.4	60.5	52.3	58.8	62.5	46.9
June	66.15	62.3	61.55	61.75	60.85	67.1	63.5	65.75	72.25	54.45
July	66.6	72.7	75.5	70	63.9	75.1	65.2	72.9	71.8	56.3
August	66.5	71.6	73.6	66.6	62.7	73.6	65.8	72.1	71.8	55.4
September	59.7	59.25	59.5	52.4	54.85	61.6	58.55	64	65.8	48.1
October	48.6	49.5	45.8	43.2	44.3	50.2	47.2	51.6	58.4	36.7
November	41.7	24.3	22.7	25.15	35.2	32.75	40.15	23.85	46.65	28.4
December	20	0.3	22.2	21.3	15	33.65	21.4	8.5	30.6	25.6

Temperature drops about 3.6F for every 1000 feet of altitude. Use the elevations above, and the temperatures below along with the elevation of a location within that state you may be interested in to get a rough idea of what temperatures are for that area. Unfortunately for Wyoming, most of the state is at a high elevation. In a typical year, there are 109 cloudless days, 85 rainy days, 23 snowy days, 86 inches of snow. In New Hampshire, there are 69 cloudless days, 167 rainy days, 43 snow days and 158 inches of snow.

Also:

The Chinook factor also needs to be explained.  In the correct Western FSP states only central Montana and eastern Wyoming have Chinooks.  Chinooks are warm winds from the south generated by being on the east slope of high mountains...Chinooks have change temps in MT and WY very quickly.  The greatest extreme being 100 degrees in Browning, MT in the 1930's (from +54 to -46 degrees within a 24 hour period). ND, AK, ID, and SD (except around Rapid City) don't have Chinooks. Neither does western MT or extreme western WY.

Ben Irvin on the FSP-state-discussion list

My general impression after looking at much weather data is that Wyoming is not Key West. However, the temperatures seem warmer than New Hampshire and cooler than Delaware. Observing the states via webcams, Cheyenne is the most consistently sunny location. Delaware is the most consistently dreary. A visit to this site shows that indeed Wyoming gets more sun than any other state under consideration. Compare Wyoming's 4-4.5 average low peak sun hours with 4 for northern Florida and 1.5-2.5 for the Northeast. Greenhouses, solar heating, and arguably photovoltaics appear to be viable options in WY.

If you'll be visiting Wyoming with a view to settling or just exploring, you might want to look into some of the following localities (these are places I like -- your mileage may vary). I've broken them down into three categories: "cities" of over 10,000 people (I use the term "city" advisedly, having lived on Manhattan Island for 5 years); towns of 2,000 to 10,000 people; and villages of less than 2,000 people.

Of the cities, I've never found Casper or Cheyenne very appealing. Cheyenne is the closest place in Wyoming to the big cow town of Denver, and it's not unheard of for folks to commute from Cheyenne to the north side of Denver, or to Boulder or Fort Collins. So if you don't want to be too far from civilization, you might want to check it out. Rock Springs is the butt of many a Wyoming joke, so it's probably not an exciting place. Gillette has grown quite a bit in the last few years because of a boom in natural gas extraction in the area. Laramie is home to the University of Wyoming so it's got more culture than other towns in the state, though the local politics tend to be more left-leaning than Wyoming as a whole. Evanston and Sheridan are two quite pleasant smaller cities and well worth investigating.

There are quite a few towns in the 2k to 10k range in Wyoming. Jackson is probably the best-known; it's also just about the only place in Wyoming that has much of a California influence, because the scenery there (Teton mountains) is awfully impressive. It's also overrun by tourists in the summer (spillover from Yellowstone National Park), so I tend to avoid it. Cody, Buffalo, Riverton, Lander, and Thermopolis are some other great small towns. I haven't spent much time in Kemmerer, Powell, Wheatland, Torrington, Douglas, or Newcastle, so I can't steer people toward or away from them. I do know that the best onion rings I ever had were to be found Newcastle, though. :)

Wyoming has lots of villages that may be intriguing to those who prefer a "backwoods home" kind of atmosphere. My favorites are Story, Dubois, Meeteetse, Alpine, Saratoga, Encampment, and Centennial.

Visit Wyoming and see for yourself!

Wyoming Tails and Trails. History and photos
Historical Society

Transportation

Is it easy to commute to jobs out of state if that were necessary. No need to spend much time here; travel doesn't get any easier than Wyoming. In Wyoming there is nothing but wide open road. I25 cuts it in half North and South, I80 crosses East and West in the South, I90 crosses East and West in the North. Most of the highways in Wyoming are in good shape, and due to the fact that there isn't a town every 15 miles, you can cover ground at a respectable pace. There are plenty of highways, going anywhere you want to go, in state, or out. Besides the paved roads, there are countless short cuts across the desert. Traveling anywhere in Wyoming is duck soup.

Anonymous person familiar with Wyoming

Miscellany

Wyoming Tribune-Eagle Newspaper
WyoDEX Websites within Wyoming

The City of Laramie as an Example

 

Laramie pop. 27,204 in Albany County pop 32,014 in Southwest Wyoming. Median household income is $28,485 with wages between $5.15 to $21.60 per hour. Cheyenne is 45 miles away, Fort Collins Colorado is 65 miles, Denver Colorado is 129 miles.

Laramie has about 34 houses of worship. There are two Assembly of God churches, Nine Baptist, three LDS, two Catholic, three Lutheran. There are also a mosque and a Synagogue.

Education

 

Wyoming ranked 8th in the nation for the lowest pupil to teacher ratio in public elementary and secondary schools. The average elementary class size is 17.4 students. Of graduating seniors, 65% enroll in college. On the ACT exam, Laramie students average 22.7 while the national average is 21.0. The University of Wyoming Fall 2000 enrollment was 9,459. Wyoming rates among the top 10 states for percentage of adults with a high school degree, high school graduation rate and per capita public libraries.

Conclusion

Wyoming is a strong contender, if for no other reason than its extremely small population. It has all the advantages of Montana (other than the border with Canada) without the tax burden, bloated government, and large population. It also compares favorably with North Dakota, since it is much less dependent on the federal government and has a much larger percentage of outsiders. The major downsides to Wyoming are its economy and its geopolitical location, although these two factors weigh down Montana and North Dakota too, and the locations of New Hampshire and Delaware are sub-optimal as well. Wyoming is worth considering seriously among the members of the Free State Project.

January 2, 2003

The views expressed in this article do not necessarily represent those of the Free State Project, its Officers, or Directors.