The Right To Leave

Many libertarians, myself included, have long wondered why those of a big-government mindset would rather fight to remake the entire country in their image than simply aggregate in a few states and thus have a much easier time progressivizing those states.

The answer, evident from countless examples, is that their ideas chase people away.

A recent report notes that New York State lost 125K residents to no-income-tax Florida, and that this exodus denied the state $14B in tax revenue.

Back in 2008, Maryland suffered a similar exodus, with new tax brackets for millionaires prompting about 10% of them to flee, and hitting the state's tax revenue by $1B.

People shocked by this are guilty of shallow thinking - and of a bit of personal projection. They either don't think through the response to increased taxation, ignoring the fact that people react to changing conditions, or think to themselves "they have so much money they won't notice or they won't mind paying more." The latter may very well be the case for some, but apparently not for all.

These "shocked" people also ignore obvious lessons of history. Why, if socialism was such a wonderful thing, did the USSR work so hard to keep people in? Why was the Berlin Wall necessary? Why was there an "Iron Curtain?" Why did Red China severely restrict emigration? Why do collectivist nations refuse to let the disgruntled among their populaces simply leave? After all, the disgruntled stand in the way of getting things done, don't they? A nation of true believers would be much more harmonious than one filled with dissenters, no?

Some time back, I recall reading about native Nevadans unhappy with a big influx of Californians, who left The Golden State because of its leftist policies but brought their left-leaning mindsets along. The Silver State used to be solidly Republican, but it is now a "swing state" in Presidential politics. Similar tales of suspicion arose as Northeasterners fled their high-tax states for the Southeast and Texas. This time, though, the fleers seem to be less apt to bring their Team Blue politics with them, as Florida has become a Team Red stronghold.

So... wouldn't those left-leaning populations in the Blue states be happy that the heretic and apostate neighbors left? Wouldn't that remove impediments to enacting the sorts of social and economic policies they desire?

The problem, and it's one they recognize whether they admit it or not, is that their way, unfettered, would accelerate departures. That the very people their system relies on - the producers, earners, and investors - have no interest in being fleeced in perpetuity. That the Marxist notion, "from each according to his ability, to each according to his need," is only appealing to those of the latter half of the aphorism. Even avowed Marxists bristle at the idea of the State telling them "this is what your job will be, and this is how you will contribute to society."

So, they need to lock the dissenters in. They need to imprison what they consider the donor class.

There are various elements that define a cult. High among them is the inability to leave. Whether via actual coercion or the soft coercion of shunning, shaming, and/or threatening, cults inhibit the right to renounce membership and live lives apart from them.

Thus it goes for modern progressivism, where disagreeing with doctrine (or daring to have voted for Trump) is guaranteed to be met with those same cult tools: shaming, shunning, and cancellation.

While there's also the ego aspect of progressivism - they see themselves as champions of the downtrodden, so they must be national - or global - in their efforts - the fear of exodus is a big motivator in chasing their agenda at a national level rather than being content to turn a few states into progressive utopias. They may excuse the exodus as bases on ignorance, selfishness, fear (baseless and stoked by Team Red's lies, of course), or other salves, but the reasons don't ultimately matter - the recalcitrance is what vexes them.

It's not enough to sort themselves into homogeneous clusters, where they all agree with each other and not have to work around opposition. They need to lock the rest of us in with them.

As a T-shirt slogan reads:

Socialism: ideas so good they have to be made mandatory.

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There is a data point worth mentioning. Massachusetts imposed a 4% millionaires’ surcharge in 2022, and there are reports that there are more millionaires in the Bay State now than before the surcharge. But, wait! Number of millionaires is not the relevant metric - tax revenue is. Someone who earned $990K a couple years ago and now earns $1.05M would count as a “new millionaire,” would pay $2000 in millionaire tax. Hardly an incentive to move if you were OK with the previous level of taxation. Oh, and I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention that inflation could easily drive up the number of million dollar earners without actually reflecting a growth in wealth in the state.

Beyond the suspicious nature of the stat, broader analysis shows a major outmigration of higher earners (i.e. $200K or more AGI) from Massachusetts. So, just like NY and MD and CA, big taxes prompt reactions in the citizens in the Commonwealth.

No matter. The sneaky statistic of “more millionaires” has some shallow thinkers believing that this latest “soak the rich” bid could be a blueprint for nationwide strategy. Which, if you’ve been paying attention, is once again about hunting down those who are trying to escape fiscal oppression.