> Mississippi can’t use social security payments to build infrastructure.

Indirectly, it can, because social security recipients spend the payments they receive, and then some of those payments incur state sales taxes, and contribute to revenue of businesses which pay further state taxes (such as income tax for employees).

And direct federal grants can't always be spent on infrastructure either – you can't use Medicaid funding to build highways.

> Also, programs like Medicaid aren’t as redistributive as you might think.

If you zoom out from individual programs and look at the overall fiscal balance: https://usafacts.org/articles/which-states-contribute-the-mo...

In FY2024, Mississippi residents received (per capita) $11K more in federal spending than they paid in federal taxes; only West Virginia, Alaska and New Mexico received more.

Meanwhile, Texas residents paid $2K more per capita in federal taxes than they received in federal spending; New York residents $4K more per capita; Massachusetts residents $5K more per capita; California, New Jersey and Washington state residents $7K more.

Nebraska got the worst fiscal deal of any US state, with its residents paying $10K more in federal taxes than they received in federal spending