Fears stoked by GOP about the rich leaving New York are based on lies

Even as Zorhan Mamdani is far ahead in polls in New York's mayor's race, a narrative persists, pushed by Andrew Cuomo and Republicans.

Zorhan Mamdani is far out front in the polls, and barring some dramatic shift in the final days, he will be New York’s next mayor. That is despite much fear-mongering about him as a Democratic socialist.

The GOP—and Andrew Cuomo, who is backed by Donald Trump’s donors—have pushed an age-old narrative about liberals (and now Democratic socialists) raising taxes to pay for their promised programs, driving the wealthy out of cities, and causing a cascading effect that ultimately hurts small businesses, communities and all residents.

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You can hear it from some small business owners often quoted in the media or just by asking them around town, people who seem to get caught up in the claims by multi-millionaire and billionaire business leaders, who have been working hard to defeat Mamdani. Several pundits have pushed this argument, as has Trump’s Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and others in the GOP.

And it was on display in last night’s final debate between the independent candidate, Cuomo—who, now a stand-in for the GOP, promised to lower taxes—the Democrat, Mamdani; and the official Republican candidate, Curtis Sliwa.

But a terrific piece in The American Prospect published today by Robin Kaiser-Schatzlein—The Myth That Mamdani Will Cause New York City’s Richest to Leave—demolishes the claims and is well worth a read. Kaiser-Schatzlein looks at years of research:

The first research comes from the Fiscal Policy Institute, which recently studied New York state tax filings from 2023 to determine how many millionaires left New York due to a personal income tax increase in 2021. They found that the top 1 percent of income earners (who make above $815,000) typically move out of the state less than any other income group. This top slice of income moved out of the state at an average rate of 0.2 percent on net.

Furthermore, when high earners leave New York, they don’t seem to do so for tax reasons. They tend to move to other comparatively high-tax states, like Connecticut, New Jersey, and California. The FPI finds that a full 72.9 percent of those with high incomes leaving New York went to high-tax states.

And that’s just the beginning. Again, the piece is worth a read to see the data and the reasons the rich actually stay put—despite changes in the tax rate—not just in New York, but wherever they are in the U.S. and around the world. The piece also looks at how raising taxes actually draws people to a city, since young workers are needed, and those workers want cities with great public transportation and other services that come via raising taxes.

The piece had me thinking about what might happen under a Mamdani administration and then had me looking back at recent mayors—and the actual truth about taxes.

Mamdani, first off, will not be able to raise taxes and create specific programs without the state legislature, the governor and the city council backing him. While Governor Kathy Hochul has endorsed him and said she supports his goals on child care, for example, she also has said she’s opposed to raising taxes. We’ll see how it plays out, but all of this will be a negotiation, and Mamdani certainly won’t have a free hand.

So, it’s pretty ridiculous that any average New Yorkers would be petrified—and it’s downright nefarious how the right-wing billionaire spin can get to them. And you don’t need studies to show how unwarranted this fear really is. Even bro podcaster Andrew Schultz, who voted for Trump in ‘24 but has now turned on him, punctured the notion while interviewing Mamdani this week, saying of the rich, “Come on, you’re not going anywhere.”

These same voters who are afraid of Mamdani often also believe—per the billionaire/GOP narrative—that Mayor Michael Bloomberg, a Republican-turned-independent, kept taxes low, and that Mayor Bill de Blasio, a progressive Democrat, raised taxes.

But, in both cases, the opposite actually happened.

De Blasio did not implement any major tax hikes, though he proposed a “millionaire’s tax” to fix the subways and a “mansion tax” on high-priced properties, both of which were blocked by the legislature.

Bloomberg, however, pushed and got tax increases, specifically on the wealthy—and even pushed for taxing the rich at a higher rate when he ran for president in 2020. Bloomberg raised property taxes by 18.5% in 2002 to cut the deficit. Later, he offered $400 tax rebates to property owners, except for the wealthy. He also raised the city’s sales tax.

And yet, in the imagination of some New Yorkers worried about Mamdani—and certainly woven into the narrative pushed by the GOP and the billionaires—Bloomberg is seen as someone who kept taxes down, presumably keeping the rich in New York, while de Blasio harmed the city, driving away the rich, something that Mamdani apparently will continue.

Not only is that narrative untrue, but, as Robin Kaiser-Schatzlein showed in the American Prospect, the rich never fled the city, no matter what happened with taxes. And it’s doubtful they will do so with Mamdani as mayor.