Funded Mandates.

The House Government Reform Committee may be focusing its attention on the unfunded mandates that the federal government passes on to the states. But there's a flip side to the story. Just ask folks out in Montana, where 46 cents of every dollar the state spends over the next two years will come from the federal government. A decade ago the figure was only 38 percent, and state lawmakers are worried about their increasing dependence on Uncle Sam in fiscally tight times.