Without citing any examples (because it seems like too many responders quibble with them rather than addressing the actual point, at least in the old forum), I'm wondering if you agree with me that most of the disparities in different state laws are actually NOT due to the differences in the cultures or makeups of the different states but rather a statistical fluke depending on who is in the state legislature and what they decide to take up.

I'm sure that you have heard hundreds of commercials ending in "not available in Iowa, New Jersey or Oregon" (if anyone writes "no I have never heard those three states alone being lumped together" I will kill myself.) Do you really think that it was the culture of those three states and not others that caused them to outlaw the product?

Again, this is almost entirely about what the examples actually are.

Laws about, say, restricting abortion are absolutely function of different cultures. Whether a state took medicare expansion money from the fed or made their own obamacare exchanges have distinct blue state vs red state cultural differences. Whether it is gambling or confederate monuments or environmental programs etc etc etc there is a lot of "cultural" issues dominating state laws.

That isn't to say there isn't some statistical variance, and sure an example you cite of a product having regulatory reasons why it is blocked in one state not another (for example products for children run into child safety laws of different strengths) is probably modeled better as variance than cultural, although you expect california to have stronger regulations than kentucky in a vacuum. So yes, obviously some variance here, and it depends issue to issue, but I don't see how you get to "most".

It seems to me that "who is in the legislature and what they decide to take up" is going to be conditioned by differences in culture and demographics, much more so than just being a random coincidence.

Or, from a slightly different angle, I think it's trivially true that you can predict a lot about what kinds of bills will be debated and passed in a state based on which party controls the legislature and governor's office. But clearly which parties control those offices is not just a statistical fluke.

It makes sense that some disparities might be a little random, e.g. differences in laws with similar intents but differing implementations, or differences in the way regulatory agencies are structured. But I doubt this accounts for "most of the disparities".

Maybe you could try to lay out your argument for thinking that this is the case?

Yes this would be very helpful. And a few specific, carefully thought through examples would really help illustrate the point I think.

One hopes the legislatures of the individual states are a reflection of the values of the people that voted them into office. At that level then yes, different states approaches to things is a reflection of the values of that state.

With a fairly limited population size of legislative bodies how exactly would a "statistical fluke" happen?

Sometimes. For example if the product in question is a firearm, then yeah, I think it's primarily cultural.

The ones you hear about are likely to have a basis in the makeup of the state population. But I would gladly bet that way more than half of all state laws that conflict with other state laws (eg pumping your own gas) are not really correlated with the desires of the residents.

Where I am going with this is actually related to things like doctor's arguments that they shouldn't be constrained from making individualized decisions even though the generalized body of work by other doctors would disagree. Maybe so, but they should realize that if they disagree, they are usually wrong.

If 48 states disagree with your legislature your legislature ought to have a good reason to disagree. Stuff like gun laws are different because they are more evenly split.

Or perhaps there should be a system along the lines where the federal government has a default position on lots of stuff and it takes a 60% vote in the statehouse to override it with a contradictory state law.

But aren’t the people in state legislature socially motivated....so they’re just a product of the states culture/makeup?

Fak...this guys making me think.

They usually don't. That's why most laws are the same.

They aren't checking with their constituents as to whether parrot's quarantine periods should be 60 vs 90 days.

Gotcha...yea, they need to call up the other states every once in awhile, lol.

Sure, but this is also the most irrelevant possible regulation. Yes, if the law in question is some state regulator making some largely trivial issue this isn't going to be a big reflection of the population and there will likely be plenty of variance. But on the big policy issues - health, education, environment, taxation, etc - are on big cultural issues - guns, LGBT rights, abortion, etc - these laws absolutely will be hugely influenced by the local culture of the state which is why "blue states" vs "red states" is something that means a lot more than just who gets elected regularly.

This is why it is all about the examples. What kinds of issues do you want to focus on? Because you can absolutely win your argument if all you want to do is talk about parrot quarantine periods.

Government power should go like gravity... 1/r^2

"Different laws for different states" is a feature, not a bug.

How about putting the most governmental power as physically close as possible to the folks who will live under it?

It is nice to be able to to actually to speak face to face with your government servant right?

THAT'S why?

David,

I think you’re correct with respect to the great majority of state laws. Momentarily convincing a state legislature to pass a particular law is not that difficult. Many are attempts by a particular constituency to bias competition in its favor. But well-organized constituencies can and do make efforts in multiple states, or get the federal government to coerce the states (eg drinking-age laws, and for a while, the 55 speed limit).

As another poster mentioned, laws on specific culture-wars issues such as abortion are much less likely to be statistical flukes.

What is the difference between states having to fall in line with other states and not having states rights at all?

Anyone who thinks Iowa, New Jersey, and Oregon is a similar grouping of states doesn’t know much about states. I highly doubt any such law exists.

Not really a fan of flippant suicide jokes, but also like he did put this right there in the OP

I would guess comparing differing laws state to state, cultural norms matter with some variance due to chance.

For example, I would expect Alabama to have higher congruence with Georgia than New Jersey; and I would expect New Jersey to have higher congruence with Connecticut than either of the southern States. But there may be some outlier laws where Georgia and New Jersey are aligned, by chance.

Surely you don't actually think I did that to discourage the three state objection.

No, it is unclear to me why you joked about suicide in the OP.

Statistical fluke isn’t the right word, but yes, many differences in state law on issues that lack cultural significance are not the product of regional differences in culture.

I feel like you are implying that there is a “therefore” that follows from recognition of this fact, but I don’t know what the “therefore” is.

I don't know about Iowa, but you can't pump your own gas in Oregon or NJ (Oregon is lightening it up a little for rural gas stations I think).