I live in a blue state: blue, the color of suffocation. It has the country's third-highest state tax rate and the highest overall tax burden. I saw those numbers posted somewhere on one of my social media feeds and some wit had the nerve to say that if you want great services you should have to pay for them.
Hilarious.
Our roads are mostly a disaster, the unions have a stranglehold on the public schools making them a complete farce, and our politicians have advanced degrees in corruption. So what we are paying for I’m not sure.
I’m also unsure that I would rather live anywhere else.
When you get to be my age you start to dream of someday retiring. I have a friend who has said that having twelve children (which she did) was not a retirement plan. Neither was having eight. Don’t get me wrong, I’d live in a box before giving one up and we are so happy to work hard for this family we’ve built but you do sort of long for a little leisure time. My grandfather was retired for 20 years before he passed away and my dad for about 14 years. In that time he traveled and volunteered and made wonderful memories with his grandchildren and great-grandchildren. It is an appealing thought to be able to do that, however, to be able to do that he had to move almost a thousand miles away to a state that doesn’t tax the air you breathe or every thought in your head. You see, someday you will pay off your mortgage, (and thank God we see the light at the end of the tunnel on that) but those taxes, never go down. Up, up, up every year. Where I live, in addition to Federal and state income taxes I pay high property taxes, a town tax, and a village tax. Those do not increase commensurate with our household income, which like many people’s has remained fairly stagnant the last few years while inflation has soared.
I’m not going to get into the politics of it (I mean, I’m sure I will but not today).
Last week, I was having coffee with a friend. She and her husband are from upstate but spent a large portion of their marriage in Florida due to his job. That job has now sent him to our state again with a promotion. Their early teen to early twenty-year-old children came with them not being in a position to go off on their own yet. Now she is afraid they won’t ever be due to the high cost of living here. The median home price is $600,000 and rents are astronomical as well. She and her husband, like so many of us, are waiting to see if the kids decide to leave the state and then we will decide if we retire, or whether to go with them.
Being a New Yorker (did I mention I live in New York?) is something special to those of us who live here. I know that being a Vermonter or South Dakotan is special too. You become part of the culture of that place and New York has a pretty strong culture. Anywhere we would go, we would always be a little out of place, unless it was Florida which seems to be southern New York and I have no desire to live there. Is it the same everywhere? If you move from Louisiana to Alabama are you considered an outsider or is the southern culture one that travels with you? What about Minnesota to Iowa?
I’m truly curious. Is New York a specific kind of culture as opposed to Southern or Midwest?
I think where your roots are become something that is so intrinsically part of you that it is hard to imagine being somewhere else. Even if you can’t wait to leave where you live, it’s still part of you. It is likely the same everywhere and I am being a snooty New Yorker in thinking it might be different. Certainly moving from the West Coast to the East Coast would have someone feeling like a fish out if water.
You might think I’m overthinking this, and maybe I am a little, but so much is wound up in these decisions. Selling the house, our biggest asset, and placing that money in another home where we hope to be happy for the rest of our lives - it’s a big deal.
I often think of the times when my children were small and I thought all the decisions would be so much easier when they grew up. Delusional I was.
I am totally willing to be an outsider and strive to make a place for myself to be near my kids or to be able to afford to live comfortably, but the idea of uprooting a lifetime of memories, friends, and connections is really hard. People are doing it though, at the rate of about half a million people per year now.
You would think that would make some people at the state legislature think, but they seem incapable of reasonable thoughts and conclusions.
Totally corrupt, with very few exceptions.
Do you have plans to escape your state? Where would you go?
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another perspective: my son is an adult living with autism. He would not have the life he has without the services he has had throughout his lifetime, in the public schools and now as an adult through OPWDD. Friends in other states (especially Florida, Oklahoma, Mississippi and Texas) cannot believe how well he has done thanks to his supports. Of course his biggest supports have been my husband, myself and other family members but although we can do much for him, other families are not able to and the services provide a lifeline. We will never leave NY and are proud to stay here and contribute to our community. We are in NYC and Mary Ellen's taxes are higher than ours. I understand how difficult the decision can be to leave one's home state. Life brings changes and we have to be flexible and do what is best for our family. I'm sure like many moms I dream that my younger son will return to NYC after college, teach at our local high school and marry a young woman with family nearby....move in down the block...provide us with grandchildren. However, that is my dream not his and i accept that. Good luck and blessings to all of us women facing this transition time in our lives :)
I live in NC, which is a state lots of folks are retiring to and migrating to. I think it is a mess overall that so many people in so many parts of the world have to flee their native territory to take care of themselves and their families Overtaxation, corruption, threats of violence- whatever it is - it is an awful shame they are put in that position. I always come back in the circular argument, why is there no way to make life better in their native place? I know it is an age-old quandary.