The Patriot Post® · Big Money Abandons Blue States

Jamie Dimon told a funny joke last November — funny, that is, unless you happen to love the blue-state model of Big Government.

“You know why New Yorkers are so depressed?” the CEO of JPMorgan Chase asked. “Because the light at the end of the tunnel is New Jersey.”

Dimon, who grew up in New York City, was speaking at the American Business Forum in Miami, and he was asked a question about the “historic relocation of both people and capital to Florida and to South Florida,” primarily from high-tax blue states, such as California, Washington, Illinois, or the Northeast. His response was that in life, you need to compete, or you’ll get left behind.

“It’s a competitive world,” said Dimon. “It’s competitive between countries. It’s competitive between cities. It’s competitive between states. And you’re mentioning a bunch of these states that are driving business out, and it will backfire. And so, people vote with their feet … because they see a better life for them and their family.”

Dimon’s message has proved prophetic, as one billionaire, one CEO, one big corporation after another is making the move from blue to red. It’s a sweet sound, an unmistakable sound, and if you put your ear to a conch shell, you can hear it clear as day: Whooosh.

The latest business titan to make that giant sucking sound is Seattle-based former Starbucks owner and CEO Howard Schultz, who’s leaving the land of tent cities and autonomous zones for sunny Miami after 44 years in Washington. Why? Because the taxaholic Democrats are chasing him out. (Schultz is too kind to say it, but I’m not.)

Schultz’s skedaddle “comes as Washington lawmakers are moving ahead with a plan to impose a 9.9% tax on household income over $1 million starting in 2029,” reports the New York Post. “The measure was headed for the state Senate this week after passing the House on Tuesday.”

In one blue state after another, with one so-called millionaire tax after another, the Democrats are declaring war on wealth. And their best and brightest and wealthiest are, as Dimon observed, voting with their feet.

Schultz, of course, isn’t alone. Nor is he blazing a trail. Amazon’s Jeff Bezos announced his departure from Seattle for Miami in 2023. As the Post continues, Schultz is simply “following in the footsteps of a growing number of wealthy businessmen who have been ditching the high-tax coasts for the Sunshine State.” Among these pilgrims are Google cofounders Sergey Brin and Larry Page, Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg, and PayPal’s Peter Thiel, all of whom beat feet out of California ahead of a looming billionaire tax. (Class warrior Gavin Newsom must’ve focus-grouped “millionaire tax” and “billionaire tax” and found the latter to be more pleasing to the proletariat.)

In addition to wealthy individuals leaving the blue states, highly successful companies are doing the same. As Fox Business reports, tech firm Palantir announced last month that it’s already moved its headquarters from Denver to Miami; energy giant ExxonMobil says it’s moving from New Jersey to the less regulatory, more business-friendly climate of Texas; same with fellow energy giant Chevron, which is moving from California to Texas; ditto, eh, Playboy, which is moving from LA to Miami; and ditto Larry Ellison’s Oracle, which moved its headquarters from California to Texas back in 2020 and recently announced another move — this time to Nashville.

Of course, no list of blue-bashing billionaires would be complete without noting that it was the world’s richest man, Elon Musk, who got the ball rolling back in 2020 when he moved from California to Texas in 2020 and took X and SpaceX and Tesla with him.

These, though, are just the richest of the rich. As Hot Air’s John Sexton notes, there’s another hugely wealthy layer just beneath them. “Maybe we’ve only heard about the 4-5 of the richest Californians leaving the state,” he writes, “but that doesn’t mean there aren’t many others who are doing the same thing quietly.”

Clearly, the Democrats aren’t learing their lesson. And until they do, the red states and their citizens will be the beneficiaries of this tax-and-spend stupidity.