[thwayunion]

It's Missouri, so I highly doubt the money is equally distributed among libraries.

You can see where aid goes here: https://www.sos.mo.gov/library/development/stateaid/default

And then you can look up or estimate the total spend for each of those community's libraries.

Likely this means approximately nothing for most suburban, urban, and exurban/college town/resort town/etc. library systems. Those communities can easily cover the difference, and their libraries have large enough budgets that a 20K hit is barely felt. Might lose some overtime or a very part-time librarian, or reduce some fringe services, or most likely just re-appropriate a rounding error's worth of local funds to make up the difference.

Very well might mean a death sentence or significant service degradation for many of the state's rural libraries.

[mulmen]

You are probably right that it is not evenly distributed. But this seems entirely on-brand for a state like Missouri. How many libraries have been ruined by these antics already?

According to some cursory searches, Washington State (where I live) has 2,500 libraries for 7.7 million people and Missouri has somewhere between 171 and 400 libraries for 6.1 million people.

At some point the horse dies and the stick is no longer motivational.

[thwayunion]

The flip-side of urban areas subsidizing rural areas: rural lawmakers threatening to cut funding is something of a nothing burger.

[temp_praneshp]

Are the politicians pushing for this from rural areas? Seems like either they are serving their constituents, or they'll be voted out next time?

[thwayunion]

> Are the politicians pushing for this from rural areas?

Predominantly.

> Seems like either they are serving their constituents, or they'll be voted out next time?

It satisfies an immediate vengeance, but is very "cut off my nose to spite my face" for rural Missourians. In 10 years when the "drag queens in libraries" moral panic is long forgotten, these communities will lament the loss of their libraries.

Your question is deep, and gets to the heart of why we even bother electing representatives in the first place.

If reps are only there to channel the emotional state of their constituents, then what's the point of having representative democracy? If representation does not come with some expectation of leadership, then representation is a poor proxy for public will with no upside. If elected officials have no moral responsibility or practical expectation to lead -- and are just reactionary automata -- then get rid of the politicians and do everything via the ballot box.

[jessaustin]

Both of the Republicans quoted in TFA "represent" suburban districts on the Kansas border. Not rural, and only technically Missourian.