If not the Millionaires, then who? (Hint, You.)

From the Star Ledger:

N.J.’s millionaires’ tax hike is losing support

By now, anyone paying attention can see that Republicans in Washington are out to screw New Jersey. We would pay higher taxes under their plan, even though we already subsidize the rest of the country.

But did you know that it could also derail plans to increase taxes on millionaires here in New Jersey? That’s a new twist, and another potent reason to resist this regressive GOP tax plan.

“We really have to take a step back,” says Senate President Steve Sweeney (D-Gloucester).

“It ought to give all of pause,” says Assemblyman Craig Coughlin (D-Middlesex), the incoming speaker.

This is a big deal. Because if New Jersey can’t raise taxes on millionaires, it can’t restore funding for schools, or fix the decrepit transit system, or ease the burden of property taxes.

It would be a $700 million kick in the teeth for the governor-elect, Phil Murphy, who has put this tax hike the core of his fiscal recovery plan.

So, why reconsider this tax hike now? Because New Jersey has one of the country’s most progressive income-taxes, with the top 1 percent providing about 40 percent of the revenue. We hit the rich hard, with the top rate of 8.97 percent.

And the Republican plans, in both the House and Senate, would eliminate the deduction for state income taxes. The impact would vary, but for a standard top earner that would translate into a hike of about 3.5 percent. A hike in the state millionaires tax would add nearly 2 percent more to the top rate.

Suddenly, the rich have a much stronger reason to leave New Jersey, and move to a state with lower income taxes.

This entry was posted in Demographics, Economics, New Jersey Real Estate, Politics, Property Taxes. Bookmark the permalink.

25 Responses to If not the Millionaires, then who? (Hint, You.)

  1. Chi says:

    FRIST

    Pumpkin a&shole

  2. Nwnj says:

    How many of murphys nanny state dreams will die with the millionaire tax? All of them? $15 minimum wage, legal weed and the millionaire shakedown all dead and the turd hasn’t been sworn in. He’ll go for a quick progressive win when he gets in.. a la Oblama’s “dreamer” overreach.

  3. 3b says:

    So which is it? The rich leave NJ or they stay?

  4. The Great Pumpkin says:

    Facts speak louder than ayn rand ideological propaganda.

    “Does raising taxes on the rich really trigger their migration to more obliging states or countries? This study of every million-dollar earner in the US shows otherwise“

    https://www.theguardian.com/inequality/2017/nov/20/if-you-tax-the-rich-they-wont-leave-us-data-contradicts-millionaires-threats

  5. The Great Pumpkin says:

    She poisoned people’s minds with this crap. It’s sad that they eat it up.

    “In the classic Ayn Rand novel Atlas Shrugged, the rich go “on strike” – withdrawing their services and disappearing from society in protest against taxes and regulation. Weary of carrying an ungrateful world on their shoulders, business leaders and other top income earners finally shrug, and leave the world without them.

    The book’s metaphor inspires political rhetoric to this day: if you tax the rich, they will leave. Variations on the threat are issued by well-off individuals all over the world – not least in the United States, where each state sets its own tax policies, and periodic warnings are issued that taxes on the rich will lead to millionaire migration to more obliging US states.”

  6. The Great Pumpkin says:

    Carrying society on their shoulders….lmfao! Sure, no one else can do it. We would be lost without these individuals….lmfao!

  7. The Great Pumpkin says:

    This is exactly what I stated on this blog many many times. They will not leave a place where they is enormous economic opportunity. So keep telling me that millionaires are leaving nj in droves for places with less economic opportunity. Yes, they are leaving one of the most economically prosperous locations for another location that provides less economic opportunity because of lower taxes….🤔

    “But does this rhetoric stand up to statistical scrutiny? To better understand elite migration across state lines, I analysed tax return data from every million-dollar income-earner in the United States. The dataset includes 3.7 million top-earning individuals, who collectively filed more than 45 million tax returns over more than a dozen years – showing where millionaires live and where they move to.

    And it turns out that place still matters for the rich – much more so than we might think.

    Only about 2.4% of US-based millionaires change their state of residence in a given year. Interstate migration is actually more common among the US middle class, and almost twice as common among its poorest residents, who have an annual interstate migration rate of 4.5%.

    While travel may be a classic “luxury good”, migration is not. Moving one’s home, life and family to a different place is mostly about people who have a poor economic fit with where they live, earn below-market incomes, and are struggling to find a livelihood. Higher income earners show low migration levels because they are not searching for economic success – they’ve already found it.”

  8. The Great Pumpkin says:

    “When millionaires do move, they admittedly tend to favour lower-tax states over higher-tax ones – but only marginally so. Around 15% of interstate millionaire migrations bring a net tax advantage. The other 85% have no net tax impact for the movers.

    Furthermore, almost all of the tax-migration moves are to just one low-tax state: Florida – where low-income taxes comingle with sun, sand and palm trees. Other low-tax states such as Texas, Tennessee and Nevada do not pick up any net tax-migration. So while some millionaires have moved to lower tax states over the years 1999-2011, the flows have been too small to change the geography of the economic elite in America.“

  9. The Great Pumpkin says:

    Lefty and 3b, do you understand this?

    “Typically, millionaires are society’s highly educated at an advanced career stage. They are typically the late-career working rich: established professionals in management, finance, consulting, medicine, law and similar fields. And they have low migration because they are both socially and economically embedded in place.

    In the US tax data, while most of the millionaires’ incomes come from wages and salaries, a quarter of them also own a business. Almost all of them are married, and most have children at home. For all these reasons, places are sticky – it is hard to move after making a career and family in a place.

    If millionaires were mostly college-going twentysomethings not yet tied to place by career or family responsibilities, place-based income tax systems would face serious challenges. We would be trying to tax the rich exactly when they are most mobile. But this is not the case. Typically, people make decisions about where to live almost two decades before they hit their peak earnings.

    This shows a kind of unexpected genius behind taxes on the very highest incomes. A tax on million-dollar income serves as an intergenerational transfer, since those who pay it are the late-career working rich: socially and economically embedded in the place.

    In contrast, most of the people who are mobile – early career professionals – do not really care about the “millionaire tax”, because if they ever pay it, it will be decades in the future, and only if they are wildly successful.

    Millionaire tax revenues could be used to invest in things that matter to young people starting out: education, infrastructure, public services, urban amenities, quality of life. And this would help to attract and retain a pipeline of future top-earners, creating a virtuous tax circle.

    This is why places with highly progressive income taxes – such as New York and California – still thrive as centres for talent and elite economic success. Their policies focus on the pipeline of future top earners. They invest in what attracts mobile young professionals – quality of life – and only send them the bill if and when they achieve their highest aspirations.”

  10. 3b says:

    So then the loss of SALT and the cap on mortgage interest deduction should not be an issue for millionaires and aspiring millionaires in New Jersey along with Murphy’s tax hike. It’s all good!

  11. The Great Pumpkin says:

    That’s who has been leaving jersey…poor who can’t afford it here and who might stay with a 15 dollar min wage. The only millionaires leaving are the ones who have made their money and are preparing to retire.

    “Only about 2.4% of US-based millionaires change their state of residence in a given year. Interstate migration is actually more common among the US middle class, and almost twice as common among its poorest residents, who have an annual interstate migration rate of 4.5%.

    While travel may be a classic “luxury good”, migration is not. Moving one’s home, life and family to a different place is mostly about people who have a poor economic fit with where they live, earn below-market incomes, and are struggling to find a livelihood. Higher income earners show low migration levels because they are not searching for economic success – they’ve already found it.”

  12. The Great Pumpkin says:

    Loss of salt and mortgage interest deductions hurts upper middle class people like myself who are not yet millionaires. I’m telling you, this gop tax plan will harm the nations economy, and not help it. Putting the cost of this tax reform on the backs of people like myself is a very very bad idea. You are hurting me to give some billionaire or corporation a tax break. My spending directly impacts the economy and there will be major repercussions for taking away my ability to spend.

    3b says:
    November 26, 2017 at 11:14 am
    So then the loss of SALT and the cap on mortgage interest deduction should not be an issue for millionaires and aspiring millionaires in New Jersey along with Murphy’s tax hike. It’s all good!

  13. The Great Pumpkin says:

    This is exactly what Phil Murphy is trying to do. He gets it! Too bad republicans hell bent on harming blue states will prob screw this up for Phil. There is a limit to what you can tax. Obviously, you can’t throw a millionaires tax on top of an already HUGE tax increase. So I don’t know why National Republicans are hell bent on harming the most productive state economies just because they are blue states. Are they trying to destroy the national economy with pure ignorance? The hypocrisy….claim that raising taxes on the rich brings harm and is a no no, but then come up with a tax plan to raise taxes on the richest state economies. 🤔

    “Millionaire tax revenues could be used to invest in things that matter to young people starting out: education, infrastructure, public services, urban amenities, quality of life. And this would help to attract and retain a pipeline of future top-earners, creating a virtuous tax circle.

    This is why places with highly progressive income taxes – such as New York and California – still thrive as centres for talent and elite economic success. Their policies focus on the pipeline of future top earners. They invest in what attracts mobile young professionals – quality of life – and only send them the bill if and when they achieve their highest aspirations.”“

  14. Not A PumkinPie says:

    I still say the ideological bent of many posters’ here blinds you to the real events.

    With the both legislative houses having a south/central bent. Watch for force regionalization along the “Camden Cty/County Police” model. Norcross broke the hand of Virtua Health lock on greater Camden’s paramedic service. Is now run by Cooper Health which is s baby.

    All of us here have a northern NJ bent. But, the southern part of the state has regionalize a lot lately – take a look at Gloucester County EMS. A lot of the regionalization was forced. The preliminary plans are already set for regionalizing al of Somerset County’s police, and I guarantee you they will use the less than 49% of previous employee model of Camden County Police. The new police force will start at lower pay and benefits and no union.

  15. 3b says:

    Can’t have it both ways.

  16. Daddy Deported says:

    Poor Pumps, I knew he wouldn’t amount to anything.

  17. Casa Cerrada says:

    Oh Dear – It seems that te Bankster did damage south of the border too.

    See today’s LA Time

    A subprime horror
    By RICHARD MAROSI | Tijuana

    NOV. 26, 2017
    The eviction squads arrive in convoys, whisking attorneys, police officers, bank agents and teams of movers through the gates of the Cañadas del Florido housing development.

    They eject the residents, seal the front doors with bricks and post signs warning against break-ins. Abandoned units blight every block of this 2,000-home community. Squatters ignore the signs and take over, their flickering candles casting an eerie glow at night.

    Maria De Jesus Silva’s turn came on a spring day in 2014, when she found a thick stack of foreclosure documents on her doorstep.

    According to the documents, the Bank of New York Mellon, acting as trustee on behalf of bondholders, had started the long legal process to evict Silva from the two-bedroom home she bought in 2006 and shared with her daughter, son-in-law and granddaughter.

  18. Casa Cerrada says:

    Highly recommend every read the multiple parts of today’s LA Times on Mexico’s Housing Bubble/Crisis.

    Look at “The Whistleblower” – What happens when big business, politicians, lack of rule of law and authoritarianism join hands. See what it looks like, because its coming our way.

  19. JJ fanboy says:

    Murphy can still get his $700 million pipe dream. He just needs to figure out how to get the non millionaires to pay on average $100 a person more to the state.

  20. Daddy Deported says:

    New Jersey needs to start paying their fair share.

  21. JJ fanboy says:

    Indeed

  22. joyce says:

    Casa,
    It’s already here.

    Plus, the US already set the precedent that you don’t need to follow the law in order to foreclose.

  23. Guomino says:

    I think it’s amazing that people want to blame the Republicans in D.C. for the massive mess in NJ.

    — NJ, where the gap between rich and poor is amongst the largest and fastest growing.
    — NJ, where the citizens of the state keep re-electing politicians that only know how to raise their taxes.
    — NJ, where retirees are forced to move away because it’s too expensive to live.
    — NJ, where the citizens are dumb enough to keep electing politicians that only know how to raise taxes and then blame others.

    All morons in NJ that keep voting Democrat deserve what they get.

  24. Daddy Deported says:

    NJ loves paying taxes. It makes the whole state like a gated community. “Don’t even try to move here Pennsy, Delaware, and NY folk. You can’t afford to live here.”

  25. ExJerz says:

    CryptoMarket smh

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