New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio claimed Sunday that millionaires would not leave the city if the state imposed a “millionaire’s tax.”
De Blasio, who supports the tax hike to fund the city’s subway system, said New Yorkers would not flee town like residents of New Jersey did when lawmakers made a similar proposal.
“There’s a lot of other people who are really devoted to living in New York City because of all we have to offer,” de Blasio told radio show host John Catsimatidis in an interview Sunday, adding that he was “not an expert” on what caused millionaires to flee the Garden State.
What de Blasio is referring to is New Jersey’s 8.97 percent tax on residents earning more than $1 million, according to data from the New Jersey Department of Taxation.
New Jersey lawmakers grew worried that millionaires would leave the state due to high taxes after the state’s highest-earning resident at the time, hedge fund billionaire David Tepper, moved his family and his business to Florida in 2016 after living in the state for more than 20 years.
Tepper made more than $6 billion a year from 2012 to 2015, and paid approximately hundreds of millions of dollars in New Jersey state taxes.
Despite New Jersey losing one of its highest-earners, state lawmakers want to increase the state millionaire’s tax rate to 10.75 percent.
De Blasio, however, does not fear that New York City residents would “only live here for half a year because of tax issues” and leave for lower-tax areas.
“I don’t fear a negative outcome,” he said during his Sunday radio interview.
The tax would require state approval, but New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said in August that such a plan would be “dead on arrival.”
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