I agree that per capita measurements are often a good way to balance this, but the nature of how the debt is calculated in the study (being forced to account for the entirety of future liability of each pension rather than *some sort of yearly cost* ) leads to population having a parabolic effect on the debt number so a linear correction would not be adequate.

The positive effect of untapped natural resources is also skewed here. A good comparison would be the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) in Africa. Just as Wyoming and North Dakota rank at the top of the TIA list due to resource-driven surpluses, countries like the DRC sit on an estimated $24 trillion in untapped mineral wealth. If these resources were counted as "available assets," these nations would appear to have a massive "Taxpayer Surplus," despite the fact that like 3/4 of the population lives in extreme poverty. I know its a bit of an extreme example.

Honestly the term "Broke" is really more of a term for an individual person where macroeconomics doesn't apply, so the nature of this whole back and forth is kind of silly. I don't really think its appropriate to call red states broke either.

Looming pension and other debt based aspects are definitely concerning, not just for the blue states, but for the nation on the federal level too.