You still have more taxpayers to shoulder the burden.

I'm from Canada, I hear all the time why cars and others items cost more here than in the US - we are more disbursed a population etc. It adds maybe 10% to a vehicle, the overhead of more distribution centres etc.

But employment cheques aren't really physical goods like cars or refridgerators.

There are upsides and downsides. In areas of high unemployment, your labour costs to run the employment centres, rents etc are generally less than in say NYC. Canada uses a small northern mining town for all of its tax processing for example, same town as the lottery commission uses. Much cheaper to operate there than Toronto.

James