The first problem with this essay, is that it is a snapshot taken now.
Yes WA is killing the pig with it's mining.
Yes Tasmania is a "supplicant" state, at the moment.
The time will come when the demand for minerals will wither away and WA will be left with a huge pool of unemployed.
The big miners will not want to know about this and will cut and run with their obscene profits.
Yes they pay more tax in WA but only the" workers".
The billionaire owners pay only a pittance and are laughing all the way to the bank.
The day is coming when Tasmania for one will be a supplier of food to the rest of Australia.
That day is when it is the only place with sufficient water to grow a food crop and all of the land is not built over good farmland.

David your going to be in government soon, how about coming up with some ideas on how to solve some of our real issues. Rather then railing at non-issues. Australia is not called a commonwealth for nothing.

The problem is not welfare for the states, but welfare for the rich! This welfare costs the budget bottom line, somewhere around 26 billion P.A?
Throw that sort of money as Tasmania, and in just one year they'd be able to afford the fast roll on roll off ferry that would allow them to send their goods to market, still very fresh and allow them to complete the fibre to the home network.
It would allow them to complete a very fast train service, that would link Tiny Tassie, with the rapid ferry!
It'd allow them to start and complete a couple of new dams, to bring water to their midlands, and totally change agriculture, to a much more productive, labor intense model.
It would allow them to build a brand new pulp mill, that utilizes plantation timber, and waste from selective logging.
It'd enable a couple of furniture factories to be built, that exported flat pack furniture to the world, but particularly Asia.
In fact, welfare for the rich if redirected, would fix all Tasmania's current economic problems in year and SA's the following year; and, NT's a year later.
It's not that we as a nation are actually short of investment capital, but quite grossly misdirect that which we do have.
Simply put, putting the problematic states well and truly on their economic feet, by simply redirecting misspent money, will enable them to stand on their own, instead of holding out the begging bowl to the rest of the states!
Not all that long ago, WA was one of those with the begging bowl extended, and given the lack of investment in non mining ventures, will one day, not to far ahead in time, be back in the very same boat.
The other problem is the GST, which should never ever been handed to the states, but reserved solely for health and education, and maybe some public transport rail options!
Rhrosty.

Wow, what a wonderful vision for our nation. A country where the rich get richer and pay less tax while the poor migrate to wherever the rich need a larger poorly paid workforce.

No thanks! The current system may have a lot of flaws but it is way ahead of what you propose.

What you want to remember David is that for a better part of the 20th century WA was as they put it a Mendicant state,you should really know what your talking about before you shoot your self in the Foot.
And the fools elected you into the Senate,what percentage of the vote did you achieve Dave, bet it was not a full quota on its own,you needed a preference arrangement with the rest of the pretenders,another pretender in the Senate like you is just what we need

@ Cobber the hound

David is not going to be in Government. He is a member of the Liberal Democrats, not the Liberal Party.

I would argue that how our Federation works (or doesn't work) is an issue that needs to be solved and is being addressed in this piece.