Taxpayers and Wealth Are Leaving High-Tax States But Murphy Wants to Raise NJ Taxes

Here’s is a Politico synopsis of a Bloomberg story that describes how high-tax states are losing taxpayers and wealth to low-tax states, and that the trend appears to be accelerating since the SALT deduction was capped.  And yet Gov. Murphy  – reflecting the desires of his public sector union pals – wants to expand the millionaires’ tax and might increase the sales tax.  Is our governor blind to the facts?  Or is it willful blindness borne of the influence New Jersey’s entrenched special interests have over him?

Governor Murphy, please run the state for the people who elected you, not entrenched special interests!

Here’s the full Politico synopsis:

SALT IN THE WOUND — “Trump’s SALT cap fuels a wealth exodus from high-tax states,” by Bloomberg’s Martin Z. Braun:“Some of the hardest evidence yet indicates that the 2017 Republican tax law is pushing money and people from high-tax U.S. states like New York and New Jersey and into low-tax states including Florida. In 2018, low- and lower-tax states gained $32 billion more in adjusted gross income than higher tax states, according to a Bank of America Global Research analysis of income migration data. The net gain — almost $2 billion more than in 2017 — was nearly twice the average over the last 13 years. The Republican overhaul capped state and local deductions at $10,000, making it harder for people to shield as much income from taxes as they could before. At the same time, states like Florida and Texas, which don’t have an income tax, are seeing more and more people move there. New York, California, Connecticut and New Jersey — the states that had the highest average SALT deductions, lost about 455,000 people between July 1, 2018 and July 1, 2019, compared with 408,500 the prior year, according to U.S. Census data. Most of the increase came from people leaving California.”