A friend of mine who runs a big finance-related firm here in New York City is scouting for new digs in Miami \u2014 not only for office space but also a house \u2014 and it\u2019s not just about the taxes.\u00a0<\/p>\n
This fella, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, is a name-brand financial type. <\/p>\n
He\u2019ll make headlines if he decides to bolt. <\/p>\n
He employs plenty of people \u2014 from highly compensated executives to middle-class support staff. <\/p>\n
They all pay their taxes in addition to their mortgages and grocery bills. <\/p>\n
They drop plenty of cash at the Big Apple\u2019s restaurants and theaters. <\/p>\n
\t\t\tMore From\t\t\t\t\t\t\tCharles Gasparino<\/p>\n
The higher-ups are big donors to local charities, the museums and the opera.\u00a0<\/p>\n
He says he hasn\u2019t made up his mind just yet but based on the tenor of our conversation, he has at least one foot out the proverbial door. He\u2019s serious.\u00a0<\/p>\n
What is crystal clear \u2014 and this is true of many of the business types I have spoken to who have packed up and left Gotham \u2014 is that this isn\u2019t about paying a few more dollars a year in taxes.\u00a0<\/p>\n
They would have no problem if it funded good schools, or more policing or better roads and bridges. <\/p>\n
It doesn\u2019t, of course. <\/p>\n
Most of all, they\u2019re sick of being portrayed as the enemy by feckless public officials.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Foremost among the latter is our socialist mayor, Zohran Mamdani<\/a>, who would like you to believe that rich people are at fault for our affordability crisis because they drive up rents when they buy penthouses. <\/p>\n Or maybe it\u2019s simply because they are the enemy in his version of Mao\u2019s Little Red Book.\u00a0<\/p>\n His solution is to milk them with a vast expansion of the welfare state. <\/p>\n He wants the rich \u201cpaying their fair share\u201d of taxes, failing to note they already shoulder the brunt of the highest combined city and state income tax rate in the country.\u00a0<\/p>\n Of course, he leaves out the fact that it\u2019s the rich, the aspiring rich and the middle class that have always paid for big government here. <\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t\tCharlie Gasparino has his finger on the pulse of where business, politics and finance meet\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n \n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSign up to receive On The Money by Charlie Gasparino in your inbox every Thursday.\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\tThanks for signing up!\n\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n That includes billions every year in free healthcare for the indigent as well as major subsidies for food, housing and transportation. <\/p>\n He also fails to mention that rent control, a perk he enjoyed before his November election, drives up rents for free-market units even as it reduces incentives to create new housing stock.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u2018Pied\u2019 after they paid\u00a0<\/p>\n Now Mamdani is looking to tax second homes worth more than $5 million for non-residents who pay property taxes. <\/p>\n We\u2019re telling rich people who don\u2019t use services to look for real estate elsewhere \u2014 and they will, if the story of London is any indication \u2014 while welcoming people who want all the welfare we can give.\u00a0<\/p>\n Just look at the numbers of who\u2019s coming and going from this once great city that attracted the best and the brightest: Our population is buttressed by a continued flow of poor migrants, while the taxpaying class flees to lower cost venues like Florida, Tennessee, Texas and South Carolina.\u00a0<\/p>\n To be clear: I\u2019m not shading the world\u2019s poor who are seeking a better life; that\u2019s part of my lineage. <\/p>\n But my lineage came here to build the subways, work in factories long before the city subsidized everything and chased out the rich who paid for it. <\/p>\n They also came here legally when we needed labor.\u00a0<\/p>\n Blame game dishonest\u00a0<\/p>\n So why would Mamdani do something as brazenly stupid and reckless as to film himself standing outside Ken Griffin\u2019s townhouse<\/a>, mock him for his success while the Citadel founder is considering a major expansion here? <\/p>\n Understandably, Griffin voiced disdain for the \u201ccreepy\u201d social-media spot to tout a highly dubious pied-\u00e0-terre tax and is now weighing sending yet more jobs outside the city.\u00a0<\/p>\n