Patterico's Pontifications

2/5/2019

New York Discovers That the Wealthy Are Rather Mobile

Filed under: General — JVW @ 10:55 am



[guest post by JVW]

From National Review Online:

New York governor Andrew Cuomo announced Monday that the state is facing a $2.3 billion tax-revenue shortfall, and argued that the deficit can be attributed to the “diabolical” recently passed federal tax-reform package.

Cuomo blamed the loss of tax revenue, the scale of which was unpredicted by state officials, on a provision in the Republican-led tax reform package that capped state and local tax deductions at $10,000, depriving the wealthiest New Yorkers of a significant tax break that defrayed the high state taxes imposed by Albany.

Those New Yorkers affected by the loss of the SALT deduction are now filing their income taxes in other states or using other means to circumvent their tax liabilities, Cuomo seemed to suggest.

Please, someone gently break the news to the Sanders/Ocasio-Cortez wing of the party that when you raise taxes beyond a certain rate, high earners are bound to take steps to mitigate their liability, as was so readily seen earlier this decade in France. Though it is certainly a fairly easy matter to change states of residence to reduce one’s tax bill, and though switching from one EU country to another is also manageable for one of moderate wealth, progressives who demand increasing federal taxes on the assumption that the rich have nowhere else to go should not overlook the likelihood of assets being moved offshore, beyond the reach of an avaricious Uncle Sam.

Andrew Cuomo is one of the slimier members of the political class: a brutish and nasty thug, devoid of ethics and willing to shamelessly prevaricate for political expediency. Yet he is cynical enough — and sufficiently dialed into the Wall Street power scene — to understand that there is a limit to which socialists can just willy-nilly confiscate money from the rich without driving them elsewhere. Of course, rather than focusing on that aspect of it he prefers to blame the Trump tax cuts for New York’s ills:

“[Capping] SALT was an economic civil war,” Cuomo said at a news conference Monday at the Capitol, referring to the State and Local Tax deduction. “It literally restructured the economy to help red states at the cost of blue states. That’s exactly what it did. It was a diabolical, political maneuver.”

State comptroller Thomas DiNapoli joined Cuomo at the press conference and backed the governor’s bleak assessment of the situation.

“This is the most serious revenue shock the state has faced in many years,” DiNapoli said, endorsing Cuomo’s prescription that spending must be cut in the budget for this fiscal year, which begins April 1.

“We have some of the soundest financial footing this state has ever had,” Cuomo said. “But we must maintain that, and if we know there’s a cut, we’re going to have to take that cut into account when we do this budget and it has to change.”

But let’s see things for how they really are in the Empire State. Andrew Cuomo ran for reelection this past year and faced his most significant challenge from his (far) left flank in the form of actress Cynthia Nixon. Because of that, he was not about to preach the gospel of fiscal discipline in an election year, and he was happy to be seen as the prudent progressive pushing public policy presents. Now that he is safely reelected, suddenly he announces that the money isn’t there — because of Trump, don’t you know — so it’s time to be realistic about spending. New Yorkers have elected this clown to three terms now, so if they resent being jerked around in this manner than it’s really their own damn fault.

– JVW

61 Responses to “New York Discovers That the Wealthy Are Rather Mobile”

  1. It takes a pretty cynical politician to trim his promises one month after being inaugurated.

    JVW (54fd0b)

  2. and this is happening in better economic times than buttboy obama imagined were even possible anymore

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  3. I know you’re trying to make me feel better about California, JVW, and I want you to know that I appreciate it.

    nk (dbc370)

  4. “[Capping] SALT was an economic civil war,” Cuomo said at a news conference Monday at the Capitol, referring to the State and Local Tax deduction. “It literally restructured the economy to help red states at the cost of blue states. That’s exactly what it did. It was a diabolical, political maneuver.”

    Note how he assumes that the prior state of affairs was natural and correct. By the same logic, the SALT deduction is a subsidy of low-tax states (mostly red) to high tax states (mostly blue).

    Bored Lawyer (998177)

  5. “God forbid if the rich leave.”

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  6. I know you’re trying to make me feel better about California, JVW, and I want you to know that I appreciate it.

    I know, right? It’s like John Candy taking a look at Sam Kinison and whispering “Man, he’s really put on some weight.”

    JVW (54fd0b)

  7. “the SALT deduction is a subsidy of low-tax states (mostly red) to high tax states (mostly blue).”

    Low tax states are generally more dependent on federal spending. They are not, and never were, subsidizing high tax states. The tax change just skews this even further, and was a contributing factor to to the house election losses in red districts of high tax states.

    Davethulhu (fab944)

  8. Speaking of brutish and nasty thugs in NY…..

    Suspect in fatal NYC subway shooting tied to notorious MS-13 gang, police say

    https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/suspect-fatal-subway-shooting-new-york-tied-notorious-ms-13-n966741

    Saw a tweet about this that said something like ‘they’ll give him sanctuary and take care of his family, but if he was a baby about to be born….’.

    harkin (0e0056)

  9. Just wait until they encroach on the Bronx and Washington Heights, the Dominicans truly dont play.

    urbanleftbehind (5eecdb)

  10. coumo should understand that he needs to make new york a low tax state like mississippi. everyone wants to move to the lower taxes of mississippi. get out your confederate flag and start waving it now coumo!

    lany (c6899b)

  11. I like New York City from the Tappen Zee Bridge

    mg (8cbc69)

  12. I think they should mine the bridges as in dark night rises and have guards at ft. Lauderdale and Miami. I know I came from Jersey but times have changed.

    Narciso (1a1ce8)

  13. A picture of RBG with todays newspaper works for me.

    mg (8cbc69)

  14. I see the President had the rabid press over for lunch, hope schiff on a shingle was served.

    mg (8cbc69)

  15. Low tax states are generally more dependent on federal spending.

    Have you seen satisfactory proof for that conjecture when Social Security and Medicare spending is factored out? Or spending on active military bases? Or upkeep of lands that the federal government has claimed ownership of? I hear this talking point a great deal, but once you get beyond federal entitlements and federal upkeep of its own property, I wonder if it is really valid.

    JVW (54fd0b)

  16. It’s a narrative unicumbered by fact, maybe if they lowered the tax just a smidge maybe there would be less outflow just saying.

    Narciso (1a1ce8)

  17. the key thing is to just take this in

    What our thug mafia friend in New York is telling us is that President Trump’s tax policies are effectively preventing NY from jacking up taxes.

    President Trump’s tax policies are effectively preventing NY from jacking up taxes.

    This is beautiful and wonderful, and it’s a glorious foundation on which to build further policy.

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  18. Maybe the govna should sell Manhattan.

    mg (8cbc69)

  19. In other news smollett should be ponying up the cost for this rabbit chase.

    Narciso (1a1ce8)

  20. Meanwhile….

    Mammoth Mtn shut main lodge today due to blizzard conditions. Over 125” of global warming since Friday.

    harkin (0e0056)

  21. Sierra Cement

    mg (8cbc69)

  22. “Sierra Cement”

    I’ve skiied dry powder many times at Mammoth but I truly hope it is the usual ‘cement’ variety, much higher water content.

    Might even get the Sierras up to an average snowpack for this time of year. The local rain gauge near my Pop’s place (in the Mother Lode) is at 86%.

    As the locals say: there is no ‘normal’ rainfall, only average.

    harkin (0e0056)

  23. “Have you seen satisfactory proof for that conjecture when Social Security and Medicare spending is factored out? ”

    Here’s a site with a lot of charts and graphs: https://wallethub.com/edu/states-most-least-dependent-on-the-federal-government/2700/

    I think that the a key point is that “dependent” states tend to be the lower GDP states, which, for whatever reason, tend to be red states.

    “It’s a narrative unicumbered by fact”

    Don’t sign your posts.

    Davethulhu (fab944)

  24. Regardless of the cause, I also believe that the tax plan was a contributing factor in the last election, for example, Orange County going blue.

    Davethulhu (fab944)

  25. Speaking of inundation……

    San Francisco Has More Drug Addicts Than Public High School Students, Health Dept Survey finds

    https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/philmatier/article/San-Francisco-where-street-addicts-outnumber-13571702.php

    A liberal utopia.

    harkin (0e0056)

  26. Every time I skied Mammoth conditions were like skiing in bubblegum and cinder blocks!

    mg (8cbc69)

  27. Would’ve loved to have hit Mammoth on a Dry Powder day. The place is full of vertical.

    mg (8cbc69)

  28. San Francisco Has More Drug Addicts Than Public High School Students, Health Dept Survey finds.

    I’ve mentioned this elsewhere on this blog, but San Francisco’s population grew by something like 33% between 1960 and 2010, but at the same time the number of school children in the city was halved. We’re going to soon be seeing closed city schools repurposed into methadone clinics and drug treatment centers.

    JVW (54fd0b)

  29. That’s another way of saying who cares how wealthy your city gets when it just becomes a playground for super-rich singles, childless couples, and retirees, alongside of a mentally ill and drug-addicted underclass?

    JVW (54fd0b)

  30. “mentally ill and drug-addicted underclass”

    Now do opioids.

    Davethulhu (fab944)

  31. opioid are for when you have bad pain and you need to have some relief from it – either cause you want to get stuff done or you just want the improved quality of life you can have when you manage your chronic pain

    some people use opioid for other reasons and they die or whatever

    sometimes they don’t die and timotheeeee chalumet gets to play them in the movie and win many award

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  32. chalamet i mean

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  33. Maybe the govna should sell Manhattan.

    mg (8cbc69) — 2/5/2019 @ 1:10 pm

    Maybe get some beads and trinkets for it.

    Bill H (383c5d)

  34. made in china?

    mg (8cbc69)

  35. “Would’ve loved to have hit Mammoth on a Dry Powder day. The place is full of vertical.”

    My first drop-in on the Cornice was when it had about a 15’ drop off the lip before you hit the slope. It looked like I was jumping off a cliff.

    I muffed it the first time and came to a stop after about a hundred yards of my brother in law laughing his head off as he skiied beside my flailing wreckage.

    But I nailed it on the second try.

    harkin (0e0056)

  36. Now do opioids”

    Now do public defecation, hypodermic litter, riots to shut down free speech and hooded and masked people attacking people for having different political views.

    harkin (0e0056)

  37. Nothing like a yard sale on the slopes.

    mg (8cbc69)

  38. Blew up on Imperial Bowl and passed everybody on my stomach. Bruised ribs – done for the year. Thankfully it was April.

    mg (8cbc69)

  39. “Now do public defecation, hypodermic litter”

    These are symptoms of the same problem, and it ignores my point that there is a massive issue with opioid addiction that mostly affects working-class white folks in rural areas, ie conservative country.

    “riots to shut down free speech” – largely overblown.

    “hooded and masked people attacking people for having different political views” – “On Wednesday, the Anti-Defamation League released a report finding that attackers with ties to right-wing extremist movements killed at least 50 people in 2018. That was close to the total number of Americans killed by domestic extremists, meaning that the far right had an almost absolute monopoly on lethal terrorism in the United States last year. That monopoly would be total if, in one case, the perpetrator had not “switched from white supremacist to radical Islamist beliefs prior to committing the murder.””

    https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/01/homegrown-terrorists-2018-were-almost-all-right-wing/581284/

    Davethulhu (fab944)

  40. Aren’t most murders committed by a relatively small percentage of the population: black males (ie, Democrats)?

    Special bonus question, at absolutely no cost to you, the reader: Isn’t davethulhu the Yiddish word for “wanker”?

    Honest Abe (7654f5)

  41. “Isn’t davethulhu the Yiddish word for “wanker”?”

    You should familiarize yourself with the site rules on personal attacks.

    Davethulhu (fab944)

  42. the anti-defamation league is basically just another hate group anymore

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  43. There are literally tens of thousands out-of-staters that own property in the lower Rio Grande Valley for tax purposes, have been for decades. I know several personally, all millionaires, mostly from Minnesota, but I’ve seen license plates from every state down here, so doubtless there are many from any number of states. They come to the Valley, buy a mobile home, house or condo, and declare it their permanent residence, because Texas has no state income tax. They just have to occupy it for one month every year to establish residency. A lot of them are Winter Texans who come every year and stay for months to escape the cold up north.

    But I knew one, Bill Smith, who was quite a character. This guy had been a Air Force pilot who flew rescue missions in Viet Nam, then became a test pilot after the war. He was flying an experimental fighter jet when it had some technical malfunction, and he had to bail out over the Rocky Mountains in Colorado. Yet he survived for days on a snow-covered mountain, with nothing but the uniform he was wearing, for as long as it took him to get far enough down the mountain to encounter some guy riding around on a snowmobile, whom he tackled and convinced to take him to safety.

    The Air Force was so impressed, he was offered his choice of assignment, thinking he would teach survival skills for pilots in Top Gun. Instead, he chose to be chief officer for UFO surveillance at Rockwell.

    The Discovery Channel did a 30 minute documentary on Bill Smith. I knew him personally forty years. He and his son, Brad, a commercial pilot, would fly down twice a year for two weeks every year, because they both owned property here. Every time they would take our family out to dinner, always at Red Lobster.

    I got a kick out of Bill, the stories he would tell about UFOs. I do not and have never believed in flying saucers and extraterrestrials, and the arguments we would have over them were hilarious!

    The reason why the Smiths took my parents and family out to dinner every time they flew down is because my mother is the queen of real estate (no, really, seriously, she is the Queen), and hse sold and managed all their properties.

    Bill passed away a few years ago of leukemia. I really miss him and his visits, the debates we had over UFOs. Brad sold all the properties in the Valley, because he owns a log cabin, actually a tow-story house he built himself in Canada, which he declares as his primary residence.

    Brad still owns property in Minnesota, and a hunting ranch in Canada that his father built, but he does not pay state income taxes in Minnesota. That is not tax evasion. It’s tax avoidance.

    One would think that these governors and legislatures would have figured out by now that the extremely wealthy, or even the retired modestly wealthy, do not know to avoid state income taxes, well, they’re idiots.

    Gawain's Ghost (b25cd1)

  44. “These are symptoms of the same problem, and it ignores my point that there is a massive issue with opioid addiction that mostly affects working-class white folks in rural areas, ie conservative country.”

    You ignore the City of San Francisco.

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  45. The commenting software used on this site lend itself to spelling mistakes.

    Gawain's Ghost (b25cd1)

  46. Abe Foxman (born May 1, 1940) didn’t die – he retired.

    Sammy Finkelman (102c75)

  47. harkin (0e0056) — 2/5/2019 @ 1:33 pm

    there is no ‘normal’ rainfall, only average.

    If they would pay attention to what’s actually going on, they would realize there’s not so much global warming, as there is an increase in the standard deviation of weather.

    This is caused not by more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, but by more di-hydrogen monoxide. It’s at a level 5% or so higher than 100 years ago.

    Sammy Finkelman (102c75)

  48. 40. Honest Abe (7654f5) — 2/5/2019 @ 3:59

    .Aren’t most murders committed by a relatively small percentage of the population: black males (ie, Democrats)?

    And U.S. citizens. Tell that to Donald Trump.

    Now not just black males, but black males who attended failing public schools.

    Sammy Finkelman (102c75)

  49. “largely overblown.”

    The only thing largely overblown is the hot air from the nitwits who resort to shouting down public speakers in lieu of actual thoughtful counterpoint…..which they are incapable of making.

    harkin (0e0056)

  50. being that uc Irvine, is at the center of the category error of speech suppression, it’s little surprise,

    narciso (d1f714)

  51. I wonder if it is really valid.

    And claims made based on 20-year-old data need to be updated. California, for example, is barely a “donor” state, only slightly more so than Texas which is about a push, even before you factor out those other things.

    Now, the state I moved to (New Mexico) is the largest recipient currently, although you have to consider that the bulk of the state is either US government property (e.g. White Sands) or Indian reservation, both of which are money pits.

    https://www.moneytips.com/is-your-state-a-net-payer-or-a-net-taker/356

    Kevin M (21ca15)

  52. BTW, if you want to understand the federal deficit, take another look at that chart. The average state nets $2000 per capita.

    Kevin M (21ca15)

  53. I wonder if NYC is mostly in deficit because no one who gets social security MOVES there, and most move away. Your dollar goes a lot farther in Florida, where there is no income tax, or here in New Mexico, where you can sell a NYC condo and buy 3 houses.

    Kevin M (21ca15)

  54. Governor Moonbeam would have blamed global warming climate. The wealthy are moving their money away from the oceans which, they are afraid, are going to rise and flood the bank vaults.

    Governor Goombah is using goombah accounting. There are two kinds of money: Money coming in, and money going out. There’s less money coming in to the Five Families because there’s more money going out to the National Organization.

    nk (dbc370)

  55. Sigh. *climate change*

    nk (dbc370)

  56. But frey supports cuomo’s rationale: read his lamentations on this re: California.

    Jb (984010)

  57. Cuomo is apologizing to the rich people who lost out on the tax deduction. But I thought the war cry of the Dems was, tax the rich!

    I guess there’s no way to fix it without looking like a total…Republican?

    Patricia (3363ec)

  58. Just like evers in Wisconsin who is raising taxes six ways from Sunday, green eggs and ham

    Narciso (413bf2)

  59. What really happened was:

    1) The Republicans lost control of the New York State Senate in the 2018 election – badly – and Governor Cuomo no longer can rely on Reopublicans to block proposals he does not like.

    2) Because of the stock market drop in Decmeber, many rich people sold stocks and took capital gains losses and have less income to report, and will pay less taxes.

    Sammy Finkelman (102c75)


Powered by WordPress.

Page loaded in: 0.0962 secs.