Higher Taxes Don’t Cause Millionaires to Flee Their Homes
Why do people have problems with taxes? I don&#x27;t. Never have. When taxes build schools and infrastructure and provide policing and social support it&#x27;s a good thing. When taxes are misused (military industrial complex perhaps) that&#x27;s an issue with the system of government, not taxes.<p>I do have an issue with the wealthiest people sheltering their money from taxation. This is the 1%. These people (at least the 0.01%) might just move for tax reasons.<p>The 2-5% top earners actually do seem to pay a lot of taxes (at least in the US and Canada).<p>I don&#x27;t know exactly what the top 5% earn, but some cursory research suggests around $250k annually in North America. As someone who has been near there, yes, I paid a lot in taxes. But I also had spare money to defer some of those taxes.<p>My experience in Canada has been different than my experience in the US. In Canada, over about 120k in salary you start paying a bit more than you would in the US. About 43% or so on everything over 90k. (Please don&#x27;t rip my numbers, I&#x27;m not a tax accountant and just want to make a point).<p>So we have a lot of people who appear to be doing pretty well, and join the rest of the middle in basically supporting the government programs for everyone else in the country to enjoy.<p>But these people are getting more than a 3rd of their income taken in taxes. At 200k per year for a family (look, I&#x27;m not asking you to feel sorry for them) that&#x27;s a big hit.<p>But if you have $10m in assets in the bank, no mortgage, and are bring in 600k per year you might actually be getting taxed close to the person in the first example. But you are left with A LOT MORE money after taxes. And this is the issue for me.