November 10, 2010, 11:14 am
Two Americas: Those who use the coersive power of the government to take money for themselves, and those who have to earn it by giving value for money in non-coerced , arms-length transactions.
Via Carpe Diem, which has more thoughts on the trend
Note: I have seen folks defend this type of chart by saying it is just the function of the inflection point of a normal distribution creeping by inflation across a dividing line. But look the $180K+ in 2010 vs. the $150K+ in 2005. By inflation, a $150,000 salary should not have increased to more than $165,000, but we see more than twice as many people making $180K plus today than made $150K plus five years ago.
February 21, 2008, 10:01 pm
In a previous post, I observed that there did indeed seem to be two Americas: the one productive people want to live in, and the one productive people are trying to escape because the local government is so controlling and confiscatory. I further observed that, unfortunately, both Democratic candidates appeared to be from the latter.
This is an interesting follow-up:
"When California faced a Mount Everest-sized $14 billion deficit in
2003, one of the major causes for the red ink was the stampede of
millionaire households from the state," says a report called "Rich
States, Poor States" by economists Arthur Laffer and Stephen Moore.
"Out of the 25,000 or so seven-figure-income families, more than 5,000
left in the early 2000s, and the loss of their tax payments accounted
for about half the budget hole."
I am not sure how they got to this number, but holy crap! 20% of the wealthiest families left the state? I'm not sure even Hugo Chavez is doing that poorly.
Update: Even more here, comparing inward and outward migration rates of states vs. a state-by-state economic freedom index.
February 16, 2008, 11:04 am
OK, I guess I have to admit that there are two Americas: The one that no one wants to live in any more and the one where everyone is moving to.
Unfortunately, it appears that our next president will be from Illinois or New York, two of the eight states the local government has screwed up so bad that no one wants to do business there any more. I guess both Hillary and Obama can claim that their states have licked the immigration problem bay increasing taxes and regulation so much that no one wants to come to their states any more.
