In the process of leaving Virginia fo North Carolina as soon as my husband retires in May. Currently pay $10k in property taxes in VA. In NC a similar home on more land will be around $3.5k for taxes. General cost of living is 30% less as well. And don't get me started with the politics that Nov 2025 delivered.
We are in IL. Our property taxes are $15,000/year. My husband doesn’t make much over 100k in the trades. Lower-middle class. No assets other than our home. No wealth at all. It’s been killing us for the past decade and robbing us of potential retirement savings or to pass anything at all onto our kids. We are among the millions that cannot afford to move quickly at all so get saddled with making others rich enough to be able to. The wealth transfer in this state is unbelievable, and sits on the backs of the hardest working men and women.
And post Covid the home values exploded goosing property taxes. I checked the IL house I sold six years ago and taxes over $19,000 now. Yikes! In AZ even though the house value went up 50% in same time frame taxes stayed level and even lowered a bit to $3,500. These are two similarly valued homes. I hope AZ wakes up and stays red but we also have many CA transplants coming in.
And while our home is a nice home, it’s in no way reflective of what kinds of homes typically pay these kinds of taxes on. What one would think in their minds hearing our taxes couldn’t be further from the truth. There’s no luxury features in the interior at all. My master bedroom looks like my first college apartment’s bedroom, low ceiling, small windows, narrow rectangle, and the master bath is meh. Kitchen is OK, very small though. Plain, bland elevation too. True lower-middle class home, but unluckily it sits in an upper class neighborhood. The house right next to us is twice the size of ours and has all the McMansion luxury inside and out you’d expect in that tax range. All the houses in this neighborhood are like that. We are the ugly, stepchild. The builder only built two houses in this neighborhood and he did a farmhouse, utilitarian design. No bells and whistles. It bothers me that we are taxed almost higher than anyone else we live next to because our house is on a cul de sac and has a screened in back porch? 🤣
Don’t get me wrong, it’s pretty I I thank God for my backyard retreat every day. It’s just the house is average to below average and we should not be paying higher than 7k at most for this place in comparison to all the homes around us.
Have you ever contested it? Lake County makes that pretty easy. I got $4,000 shaved off a decade ago by showing them area comps but it’s crept up and way surpassed where it was back then.
We never could afford the attorney. And the ones that did it for a percentage of our savings made it practically not worth doing. Our neighbors did it 12 years ago, their taxes are right back where they would have been had they not done it. They lost half the savings paying the attorney, so the only winner was the attorney.
I did it myself a few times. No attorney. Using their online tool. Once got that reduction and others just kept it flat instead of an increase. But yes it’s very temporary. Like calling the cable or phone company every year and threatening to leave! They miraculously find a discount.
In NJ we can appeal our assessment ourselves. We just have to submit comparable sales in town and come to see people in court ourselves. We were able to cut assessment by $20,000, but unfortunately assessor changed it back next year. We only had to pay $150 for hearing.
There is a limited time to do it from when you receive your assessment card until the first of January.
Mine still has original windows from the 60’s that don’t open very well and good luck using the screens! and very old mechanicals. Plus a leaky basement despite my best efforts because house is adjacent to a flood plain. Yet in the last six years Zillow says my home has doubled in value since I sold it. Sure it did. Insanity.
This is all part of the plan; separate you from your money, no matter how little you have scrounged away. I spent 6 months in Niles, working a contract and couldn't believe how expensive it was - that was 2015! Don't let them "kill you". Make a plan and get out; don't run from something but run to something you want. There are solutions,find yours.
We are!! We are trying to. It’s a lot harder without any liquid assets. But we will be leaving as soon as my husband retires in the next 3-4 years. I hope!!!! Trying to do anything faster will cost us a lot of our equity. What a balancing act. We are going to lose, just trying to find the pinnacle where we start to lose more by staying that the loss we take by leaving.
Yes. Similar situation here 30 miles west of Chicago. Our roots are here. Our community is here (but many are moving). $10k in property taxes. Can't afford to move at this time.
15K a year for property taxes? Good grief! Texas has high property taxes, which we protest every year, but at least we don’t have a state income tax. I’m sorry yours are that ridiculously high.
Your husband can make over 100K in Florida in the trades, likely as a foreman overseeing new developments. A home will cost less and be taxed by half. I left NY in retirement and my savings from zero income tax and half the property tax allows 5 months of northeast living each summer.
When I looked at homes in FL comparable to what ours would sell for, it was 1/3-1/2 the size and as basic as you can get. Literally a box with windows and nothing more. Anything comparable to ours but smaller was well over 1-1.5 million. I keep hearing it’s cheaper, you get the same for a lot less elsewhere, but that’s not what I’m finding. I think the past three years has changed that because home pricing in the desirable states has skyrocketed. We’d have to take out another 30 year mortgage to afford what we want, and that’s after lowering our initial expectations significantly, which we were willing to do. We were supposed to be able to pay cash for our retirement home with our equity. 🫤 Not so. Possibly you got out at just the right time.
Also, my husband will tell you it’s not easy to just move and sign the union books at a new location and land a foreman position. He’s been a general foreman for 15 years now, superintendent for 2 of them before the market crash in 2008/2009. But he’s 59. His age, and his lack of business savvy, place him at a disadvantage. Mad skills for sure, perfectionist in his final work, great at managing any job … but he’s not a “leader” or “innovator”. Not sure if you can imagine that kind of worker bee. He’d have better chances if he were younger. Especially this close to retirement, companies won’t see him being worth any investment. (He’s commercial btw …)
It’s a shame, he could teach apprentices alongside him but nobody taps him for that.
You’re shopping in some high-end areas close to the coast apparently. Location matters, a lot. Look into SC. A lot of NY’ers find more house on larger lots there, much less in property taxes, a bit of income tax. A friend just bought a 4,000 square ft home in a gated community with golf, a lake for boaters, for 600K in Greenwood, SC. I estimate his property tax at 5-7K because I had a place in Bluffton 10 years ago.
With you there. Our taxes are half that, but we live in a modest house in a modest neighborhood of 90 year old houses just down river from the Fox Chain of lakes. Neighbors just south of us pay as much or more as you. And every single bit of it is for government pensions and teachers' unions. I'm embarrassed to say that Governor Jelly Belly was a friend of my brother in high school. My brother is embarrassed by it too.
That's mostly BS. Maybe with the exception of Bend where the entire gay community of SF has a second home, OR and WA were doing fine ruining their own states with their own brands of libtards before CA entered the equation. If anything the CA'ers moving to OR and WA are the sensible ones.
Interesting. Those two states are absolutely gorgeous, but off the potential list. It would be akin to jumping from the burning building into a full blown dumpster fire 🔥💥🔥😆
Yes and since I have moved to the Eastern Pan Handle of WV there are thousands of swamp rats moving in and affecting the area. I am from away but I did purchase a 26 yr old home in an old development. But these people are causing a housing boom with cluster development after cluster development and taking all of the farmland. It is awful. I wish they would stay in DC. That is where they belong. LOL. I sound like a native. But that is exactly what happened in Kennebunk Me where I moved from. It ruins things.
I thought abt giving you hints like our 2020 capitol county elections are being examined by the FBI. Or mentioning Fani W. but that’s just humiliating. GA 🍑 here, born and raised. Pls bear in mind if you’re considering a move, GAs overall look and feel is as radically different from city to city as any other place I have ever been. You can’t judge this book by the cover. Please don’t judge it by the airport, either. Really, REALLY don’t judge it by the airport. 😆🤢😆
I assure you that LAX is a nightmare on a much the same scale as Atlanta! Only ever been to Atlanta, so cannot comment beyond that experience. I pretty much despise all big cities, so there’s that fact!
Thanks for the information. Most everyone I have ever encountered from GA is absolutely lovely 🥰
I like most of the Georgians I meet as well. I’ve never been to LA. Our eldest daughter has. She had her back pack, laptop and luggage sorted of hidden in their rental
car while they ran into a coffee shop really quickly. They were in there 11 minutes! The window was smashed and all her stuff was stolen. They found her wallet with the pictures at least still in it, about a block away. 😳
Trying like the dickens to persuade my husband to up and sell and get out of Hochul-ville. Her electric theory is nonsense and she’s already acquiesced to Mad-ami to solve NYC balance sheet problems once - we are toast.
We left MI for NC in 2012. Absolutely love it here. Just praying that all the smart-money libs fleeing the northeast don't bring their politics with them.
I don't foresee anyone "blaming themselves" for the mess. With Socialists, it's always, "I don't understand it! It should have worked! It was probably something in the environment! And the fact that our control wasn't complete! We just need a new environment, and we can try again, and again, and again..."
I hope NC institutes border-control policies forthwith.
Actually this is how authoritarian regimes begin. When they can’t get the rich to volunteer to give their money away, they force them and take it. When there is freedom for them to move and avoid it, they take over the nation’s government and force people against their will with the full force of the military and law. How can they not see its inevitable development? After Covid there is NO doubt they would force people to “obey their plan” and control every step we take with a brute boot.
Socialists believe in their heart of hearts that "people are stupid" and "stupid people must be led by the nose-ring because they will never 'understand.'"
It is left to us to prove they are wrong (for which election evidence has not been persuasive).
Libs also think those below themselves economically or racially are stupid. There’s a whole lot of people out there who feel superior. Even middle class libs have that problem.
Here in FL, the landscape has changed with COVID. Prices surged and enjoyment diminished. The little villages often were overrun by the fleeing pandemic victims of the north. They came with their big sacks of money and bid any price to settle. They didn't buy into the culture and way of life; they peddled THEIR ways, gentrifying as they went. A place like Boca Grande is empty of its generation of natives because it got too expensive; so, they live away and drive to work now. We hear that there's a reversal now: too hot, too humid, and too many hurricanes! Ok then, go home to Mamdami and Pritzer and fix your own state!
Stay out of the Asheville city limits at very least and even Buncombe County. The local politics are captured and will never change. The mayor is an idiot. She refuses to re-hire a bunch of cops who retired early or left a few years back. In the thirteen years we've been in the area, we watched the beautiful downtown deteriorate bigtime. The smart money is now moving out of the city. We just moved from Arden over closer to Hendersonville. The Johnson City area is nice.
My son was one of the engineers who were affected when ThermoFisher announced they are closing the Asheville location (I wonder why) but providentially God arranged for them to stay, he’s now working in Arden! Small world!
Marlene: Ashville is beautiful, as you prob know, but very liberal, and expensive. J.C. would be a better choice, imo. Same beautiful country with lower cost of living.
And some states like Maine track you and hunt you down if you leave the state and take up citizenship in another state and keep the home there for renting. They track your moves and if you spend one day over 6 months in Maine you owe the ungodly amount of State income taxes. I hear California and Illinois are even worse.
I'm jealous. My husband refuses to leave our high tax state because he's so attached to our house. And the irony is that soon we may have to sell it because our property taxes go up every year (to support a failed public school system) while our retirement income does not.
Fair point, yet what a state gives up in property tax they claw back in other areas. My BIL moved out if NC into VA bc the money grab from his hard won retirement savings was higher in NC than VA. My point (and Jenna's too I think) is that government is going to take our money as creatively as they can so that the big fat middle we belong to continues to fund their bloated carcasses and hopefully we don't notice or if we do can's move easily out of one state to another
I moved from Maine to WV and pay half the taxes at least. My property taxes went from $6800 to $3600 and we have a much nicer home here and the personal property taxes are less also. AND no tax on SS and I am retired and that makes a huge difference.
PBD and Tom recently discussed this on an episode of his podcast. Their biggest point?
The ultra-rich are not nearly as tied to manufacturing (physical factories) as they were decades ago. I cannot remember exact numbers, but the point was that it is far easier for "The Rich" to leave and move somewhere else today than in decades past. In other words, wealth is far more mobile than it used to be.
In that same episode, they discussed the trillions that have already left CA and the landslide of trillions getting ready to leave because they put the 5% wealth tax on the ballot for November.
I was discussing this very topic years ago with a friend who manages a flooring mill. He said something that sticks with me to this day... "Have you ever tried working for a poor person?"
The wealth tax is particularly bad because it taxes 5% of one's net worth.
Anyone in business knows any number of professions or careers (around here it might be loggers / saw millers, or ranchers) that have a huge amount of product pass thru their businesses (very large gross income), but the margins (net income) are relatively small.
Don't get me wrong, these people are not destitute -- they do OK for themselves. But they do not live like they're rich. Their net worth is tied up in land, equipment, and/or facilities -- non-liquid assets. Coming up with 5% of their net worth would DEVASTATE many of them.
PBD and crew discussed this as well. A rancher might be forced to sell land to pay the wealth tax, incurring a significant capital gains tax along the way. And then he cannot raise as many cattle. A vicious cycle of theft and multi-generational destruction.
Great point. When I first read about these bozos (I'm being far too kind using such a fun and friendly term for them!) were targeting net worth and not income...I had the same reaction as you! This is a new game, a much more deadly game.
Grain farmers are in the same bind as ranchers. Their ‘on paper’ wealth does not reflect the reality of trying to make enough surplus money to pay taxes, employ reliable help (with benefits), and maintain/replace equipment costing $.5M and up.
One of the big ironies is that most socialist leaders/zealots like Mamdani grew up as a rich nepo baby. Like Thomas Sowell said, “The offspring of privilege have dominated the leadership of Marxist movements from the days of Marx and Engels through Lenin, Mao, Castro, Ho Chi Minh, and their lesser counterparts around the world and down through history. The sheer reiteration of the "working class" theme in Marxism has drowned out this plain fact.”
Do people really think the Mamdanis of world will bring their child to “free” day care or shop in government stores?
When pressed on how, in the face of overwhelming evidence that socialism does not work, that it leads only to poverty, millions of deaths and destruction as evidenced by much of the past century, people can still believe in it, Milei reflected: “Because socialism is a sickness of the soul worse than the very worst cancer. When it is implemented completely, economically, politically, you get 150 million deaths. The worst dictators of the past century, they were all socialist.”
I’m unsure. It does seem like they feed off each other though. They seem to have a lot in common of basically screwing the working productive class for the benefit of the elite non-productive class (eg. Bolshevik leaders). Both policies work until they run out of other people’s money.
Seems to me the Bolshevik Communists gave, and continue to give, the Socialists real competition for the group that has done and continues to do the most slaughter and destruction.
Frankly I don’t care about their money. That’s what NY and CA and IL care about. I just care about their common sense. Money will naturally flow from that.
"We’re talking about a system that historically produces food shortages, forced labor, censorship, wealth confiscation, economic stagnation, mass surveillance, and widespread, government-induced famine."
Sure. But it also it is also going to produce "equity." You can eat equity, right?
You can, but you might not like it. Farmers’ fields are actually full of it.
Just find the biggest cow he has, stand behind it (about 10’ so you don’t get kicked), and wait for the twitching that means the tail is about to lift. That’s how you know the equity is coming.
Saw a recent AI generated video of a leopard or other big cat animal holding on to the tail area of a hippo as it's trying to escape.
Then an explosive blast of diarrhea comes out, spraying the predator in the face. It reacts, flipping over high in the air, the front covered with crap, and gagging pretty badly.
The video then goes on to show a woman, closeup, braying like a donkey, laughing and saying "Did you see the look on its face? AHAHAHAHA!!" (cackling) The guy next to her leaves, because.. Can you see the look on the woman's face?
The irony is hilarious.
I think this is the link. (I don't have an Instagram account. Hopefully someone has the link to it on another platform)
I yearn for a second, bloodless, revolution, always hoped-for by Jefferson, but I fear that "If we ever return to a government we can 'afford,' America may not be able to defend herself from the superpower communists seeking pastures greener than the ones they've despoiled."
I wish I could see a path that left us well defended, but stripped of all the bloat of Socialists' "programs."
I blame the Socialist incubators, known as "schools." I'd start reforms there, reintroducing the theme of the (great) "melting pot," and replacing Socialist "ideals" with what-our-ancestors-exuded: self-reliance, innovation, patriotism, belief in the Christian God, and tolerance (which is not to say blind acceptance).
The problem seems to be that, in a democracy especially, but even in a republic, freedom is always only a few "election cycles" away from disappearing forever.
EDIT: In a way, Trump was that "bloodless revolution", except for the lunatics bent on assassination, and I remember before him there was the Tea Party movement. Both seemed to come out of nowhere, surprising the status quo which tried and failed to eliminate them. Wish someone would study these phenomena and explain how to trigger the next ones.
I don't know, MK, communists appreciate "value" in propaganda, so there may be something to Justin's idea of the red b*st*rds hosting an emigre' commune of worthless, sniveling, socialist, former-American asses. (They'll accept the skimpiest of rations, and Thank the State! for it.)
I’m not saying don’t try to send them, I’m just doubting Chyna wants them. Although the CCP does have more persuasive methods to make people comply than we do…
I saw a while back an interview with a Chinese woman saying they have vastly overstated their current population size. She reviews the number when Mao came to power and the one child policy and said to get to where they say they are today the births per female would have to be almost 5. Could somewhat explain the empty apartments.
If the Association for Alliterative Accomplishment gives prizes for outstanding and inventive alliteration, this phrase should win the gold: "after years of watching flush Frenchies flee with their fortunes." Yowzer!
In 1997 I moved from NYC to LA. I went out as a west coast editor for MLLE but was hired on staff at Shape, which was based in LA. The first week there I got invited to go kayaking in Santa Barbara. I didn't know what a kayak was or where Santa Barbara was, so of course I said yes. Hahaha but actually. My (now) hubby was the guide. Dated long distance (2 hours) for a while, and since his biz was based in SB and I could freelance from anywhere, I moved to SB. (In another post I'll tell you about the "kayaccident" that happened that day, which is mostly the reason we're together today. Hint: I WAS FROM NYC. Hardly the sporty, athletic type LOL.)
Two hours is "long distance"? Oh Jenna... try "other side of the country" or "Europe"... now that's a long distance relationship (especially when the Internet was brand new).
I mean, we weren't going to get married without ever living in the same town! We had different friends, different lives, different routines. We both had pets we had to leave to spend a weekend together. There was no "you free for lunch?" It's different! :)
got ya'll beat, since my beloved is 10 hours (in a plane) away. I would love for it to only be 10 hours in a car! that would be wonderful. other side of the country would be sooooo much better than other side of the freakin' world. but yeah, without the Internet, never would have 'met' in the first place. so there's that...
The greatest illiteracy among commies might be how much the rich actually pay in taxes. Yes they have lawyers and accountants to minimize the damage and find loopholes, but that generally only lowers their payments by several percentage points…which in the game of billionaires could be tens of millions of dollars and more than covers the cost of the accountants that you and I can’t afford.
Somehow these nitwits think the rich have some magic loophole that lets them pay nothing, rather than the actual loophole that lets them avoid a ridiculous 37% tax rate, which btw starts at $640k. There is no special rate above that for say $10M or even $1B.
Meanwhile, I’m still pissed that Pennsylvania insisted on collecting 4% of my father in law’s estate just for him to have the privilege of dying. TN repealed their inheritance taxes in 2016, because nothing says take your money and retire somewhere else like a high inheritance tax.
The inheritance tax is nothing but a rip off. It is absolute robbery. You work hard your whole life so that your progeny can have a little nest out of their own, maybe a little financial security in a world gone mad, and the state wants to take it. I say fuck the state. I’m currently in Virginia and I definitely say fuck Virginia. Trying really hard to get out of here right now.
I lived in Caroline County in ‘97 and then Stafford County in ‘03. When I moved to TN in ‘07, those bastards had the gall to send me a car tax bill for ‘08 and the part of ‘07 that I didn’t live there.
I sent them the copy of their code that specified who was eligible for car tax instead and never heard back.
I’m not surprised. Virginia will literally tax the air that you breathe. And I do believe that most of our state is red. I’ve been here. My whole life lived in various parts of the state. Family everywhere. I sincerely do not believe that scam Berger was duly elected. Fake election all the way.
I got a lotta reasons why I read Jenna - the memes, the common sense understandable lay-it-all-out-there blogging style, but the number one reason I read Jenna is I can HEAR her talking as I read her stack. One for instance - (Maybe they have nicer running shoes HAHAHAHA!) I’m already laughing typing this. Another that I can’t unhear in my head - “Kansas has the largest ball of twine……..I mean WHYYYYY?) LMAO.
Seriously, the sentence contained in the meme that encapsulates her “Everyman” views was this - “The Altruism is Merely Performative.” Isn’t that the truth, tho. The 1 percent has aspirations to my nickel and to use it to be the ruling class. I am so outta NY.
Kansas is having problems of its own now. We desperately need a Republican governor and do not need any more progressive “performative” types moving here.
I am def a chatty Cathy this am. Can’t be Ks, tho - when would I ever see my grands!?!! Gotta be NC or Tenn. (Which has no income tax. BTW. Jus sayin’…)
Trying to figure how TN raises dough with no income tax, I was reminded of the great SNL skit about "First Citiwide Change Bank"--"with locations conveniently near toll plazas"--where, "when you come in, if you give me a ten, I can give you two fives, or a five and five ones or... we WORK with the customer!" A bank official was asked, "So, your business model is that your bank 'just makes change??' How do you make any money?"
The completely unforgettable answer, "One word: Volume!"
Flat tax. As a professional before retirement my observation is our tax code is a mire of loop holes. As a business owner it was disheartening to see over half of the profit gone. There were years that we questioned whether we would be better off just closing and letting some one else carry the risk, work our 40 hours, and have a life outside the business. What kept us going? All the people who depended on their paychecks. The business wasn’t just us. It was staff’s mortgages, kids schools, medical insurance for spouses that were ill, it was not who wants to be a millionaire.
I know this is crazy, but a Flat tax, a balanced budget, and prioritize a distribution of the excess to citizen support systems that verify the recipient’s eligibility (information from tax filing) rather than funding countries outside our borders. This doesn’t mean I feel global responsibility isn’t valid. But you need to care for the system at home before we care for those outside.
Cherylann, you are not the first business owner I know of who felt the weight of their loyal employees finances on their shoulders. Your family's sacrifice brings new meaning for me to the words "business class." Your points are well spoken and taken.
Totally agree. Money goes where it's treated best. Always has and always will. Both metaphorically and literally. As it turns out, greed and envy don't pay the bills. But they sell, I guess. 💕
In the process of leaving Virginia fo North Carolina as soon as my husband retires in May. Currently pay $10k in property taxes in VA. In NC a similar home on more land will be around $3.5k for taxes. General cost of living is 30% less as well. And don't get me started with the politics that Nov 2025 delivered.
We are in IL. Our property taxes are $15,000/year. My husband doesn’t make much over 100k in the trades. Lower-middle class. No assets other than our home. No wealth at all. It’s been killing us for the past decade and robbing us of potential retirement savings or to pass anything at all onto our kids. We are among the millions that cannot afford to move quickly at all so get saddled with making others rich enough to be able to. The wealth transfer in this state is unbelievable, and sits on the backs of the hardest working men and women.
And post Covid the home values exploded goosing property taxes. I checked the IL house I sold six years ago and taxes over $19,000 now. Yikes! In AZ even though the house value went up 50% in same time frame taxes stayed level and even lowered a bit to $3,500. These are two similarly valued homes. I hope AZ wakes up and stays red but we also have many CA transplants coming in.
And while our home is a nice home, it’s in no way reflective of what kinds of homes typically pay these kinds of taxes on. What one would think in their minds hearing our taxes couldn’t be further from the truth. There’s no luxury features in the interior at all. My master bedroom looks like my first college apartment’s bedroom, low ceiling, small windows, narrow rectangle, and the master bath is meh. Kitchen is OK, very small though. Plain, bland elevation too. True lower-middle class home, but unluckily it sits in an upper class neighborhood. The house right next to us is twice the size of ours and has all the McMansion luxury inside and out you’d expect in that tax range. All the houses in this neighborhood are like that. We are the ugly, stepchild. The builder only built two houses in this neighborhood and he did a farmhouse, utilitarian design. No bells and whistles. It bothers me that we are taxed almost higher than anyone else we live next to because our house is on a cul de sac and has a screened in back porch? 🤣
Don’t get me wrong, it’s pretty I I thank God for my backyard retreat every day. It’s just the house is average to below average and we should not be paying higher than 7k at most for this place in comparison to all the homes around us.
Have you ever contested it? Lake County makes that pretty easy. I got $4,000 shaved off a decade ago by showing them area comps but it’s crept up and way surpassed where it was back then.
We never could afford the attorney. And the ones that did it for a percentage of our savings made it practically not worth doing. Our neighbors did it 12 years ago, their taxes are right back where they would have been had they not done it. They lost half the savings paying the attorney, so the only winner was the attorney.
I did it myself a few times. No attorney. Using their online tool. Once got that reduction and others just kept it flat instead of an increase. But yes it’s very temporary. Like calling the cable or phone company every year and threatening to leave! They miraculously find a discount.
In NJ we can appeal our assessment ourselves. We just have to submit comparable sales in town and come to see people in court ourselves. We were able to cut assessment by $20,000, but unfortunately assessor changed it back next year. We only had to pay $150 for hearing.
There is a limited time to do it from when you receive your assessment card until the first of January.
Mine still has original windows from the 60’s that don’t open very well and good luck using the screens! and very old mechanicals. Plus a leaky basement despite my best efforts because house is adjacent to a flood plain. Yet in the last six years Zillow says my home has doubled in value since I sold it. Sure it did. Insanity.
This is all part of the plan; separate you from your money, no matter how little you have scrounged away. I spent 6 months in Niles, working a contract and couldn't believe how expensive it was - that was 2015! Don't let them "kill you". Make a plan and get out; don't run from something but run to something you want. There are solutions,find yours.
We are!! We are trying to. It’s a lot harder without any liquid assets. But we will be leaving as soon as my husband retires in the next 3-4 years. I hope!!!! Trying to do anything faster will cost us a lot of our equity. What a balancing act. We are going to lose, just trying to find the pinnacle where we start to lose more by staying that the loss we take by leaving.
Yes. Similar situation here 30 miles west of Chicago. Our roots are here. Our community is here (but many are moving). $10k in property taxes. Can't afford to move at this time.
15K a year for property taxes? Good grief! Texas has high property taxes, which we protest every year, but at least we don’t have a state income tax. I’m sorry yours are that ridiculously high.
Yeah we have really high state income taxes too. I hate Prickster
Your husband can make over 100K in Florida in the trades, likely as a foreman overseeing new developments. A home will cost less and be taxed by half. I left NY in retirement and my savings from zero income tax and half the property tax allows 5 months of northeast living each summer.
When I looked at homes in FL comparable to what ours would sell for, it was 1/3-1/2 the size and as basic as you can get. Literally a box with windows and nothing more. Anything comparable to ours but smaller was well over 1-1.5 million. I keep hearing it’s cheaper, you get the same for a lot less elsewhere, but that’s not what I’m finding. I think the past three years has changed that because home pricing in the desirable states has skyrocketed. We’d have to take out another 30 year mortgage to afford what we want, and that’s after lowering our initial expectations significantly, which we were willing to do. We were supposed to be able to pay cash for our retirement home with our equity. 🫤 Not so. Possibly you got out at just the right time.
Also, my husband will tell you it’s not easy to just move and sign the union books at a new location and land a foreman position. He’s been a general foreman for 15 years now, superintendent for 2 of them before the market crash in 2008/2009. But he’s 59. His age, and his lack of business savvy, place him at a disadvantage. Mad skills for sure, perfectionist in his final work, great at managing any job … but he’s not a “leader” or “innovator”. Not sure if you can imagine that kind of worker bee. He’d have better chances if he were younger. Especially this close to retirement, companies won’t see him being worth any investment. (He’s commercial btw …)
It’s a shame, he could teach apprentices alongside him but nobody taps him for that.
You’re shopping in some high-end areas close to the coast apparently. Location matters, a lot. Look into SC. A lot of NY’ers find more house on larger lots there, much less in property taxes, a bit of income tax. A friend just bought a 4,000 square ft home in a gated community with golf, a lake for boaters, for 600K in Greenwood, SC. I estimate his property tax at 5-7K because I had a place in Bluffton 10 years ago.
Come to Tennessee!
With you there. Our taxes are half that, but we live in a modest house in a modest neighborhood of 90 year old houses just down river from the Fox Chain of lakes. Neighbors just south of us pay as much or more as you. And every single bit of it is for government pensions and teachers' unions. I'm embarrassed to say that Governor Jelly Belly was a friend of my brother in high school. My brother is embarrassed by it too.
We’re getting waves of Californians. They buy homes 6x as large as the Cali homes and pay far less of a mortgage and far fewer taxes as well.
I am so sorry to hear that. Californians need not apply anywhere else, especially if you are a libtard.
I wholeheartedly agree, Lori. The Cali Libtards have infiltrated many red states and brought their shitty attitudes and Keynesian bullshit economics!
I assure you, my family are not Libtards and are looking to exit the Socialist Republic Clown Shit Show of Cali!
@Kat- Oregon and Washington have been ruined by those Californians.
I don’t doubt that at all. I am suffocating with the sheer stench of Libtards! They are like cockroaches!
That's mostly BS. Maybe with the exception of Bend where the entire gay community of SF has a second home, OR and WA were doing fine ruining their own states with their own brands of libtards before CA entered the equation. If anything the CA'ers moving to OR and WA are the sensible ones.
Interesting. Those two states are absolutely gorgeous, but off the potential list. It would be akin to jumping from the burning building into a full blown dumpster fire 🔥💥🔥😆
Yes and since I have moved to the Eastern Pan Handle of WV there are thousands of swamp rats moving in and affecting the area. I am from away but I did purchase a 26 yr old home in an old development. But these people are causing a housing boom with cluster development after cluster development and taking all of the farmland. It is awful. I wish they would stay in DC. That is where they belong. LOL. I sound like a native. But that is exactly what happened in Kennebunk Me where I moved from. It ruins things.
Good to hear you are escaping from Alcatraz! Get out soon Kat!
It's too bad that they're missionaries for what they're escaping, and not more in the refugee category.
And of course drive up the price of homes in the process!
Do you mind sharing the state, KC? I would certainly like to know as I do my due diligence.
I thought abt giving you hints like our 2020 capitol county elections are being examined by the FBI. Or mentioning Fani W. but that’s just humiliating. GA 🍑 here, born and raised. Pls bear in mind if you’re considering a move, GAs overall look and feel is as radically different from city to city as any other place I have ever been. You can’t judge this book by the cover. Please don’t judge it by the airport, either. Really, REALLY don’t judge it by the airport. 😆🤢😆
I assure you that LAX is a nightmare on a much the same scale as Atlanta! Only ever been to Atlanta, so cannot comment beyond that experience. I pretty much despise all big cities, so there’s that fact!
Thanks for the information. Most everyone I have ever encountered from GA is absolutely lovely 🥰
Thanks!
I like most of the Georgians I meet as well. I’ve never been to LA. Our eldest daughter has. She had her back pack, laptop and luggage sorted of hidden in their rental
car while they ran into a coffee shop really quickly. They were in there 11 minutes! The window was smashed and all her stuff was stolen. They found her wallet with the pictures at least still in it, about a block away. 😳
Trying like the dickens to persuade my husband to up and sell and get out of Hochul-ville. Her electric theory is nonsense and she’s already acquiesced to Mad-ami to solve NYC balance sheet problems once - we are toast.
@Marlene- yup. I just said the same thing.
She’s alarmingly dumb.
We left MI for NC in 2012. Absolutely love it here. Just praying that all the smart-money libs fleeing the northeast don't bring their politics with them.
I don't foresee anyone "blaming themselves" for the mess. With Socialists, it's always, "I don't understand it! It should have worked! It was probably something in the environment! And the fact that our control wasn't complete! We just need a new environment, and we can try again, and again, and again..."
I hope NC institutes border-control policies forthwith.
Actually this is how authoritarian regimes begin. When they can’t get the rich to volunteer to give their money away, they force them and take it. When there is freedom for them to move and avoid it, they take over the nation’s government and force people against their will with the full force of the military and law. How can they not see its inevitable development? After Covid there is NO doubt they would force people to “obey their plan” and control every step we take with a brute boot.
Socialists believe in their heart of hearts that "people are stupid" and "stupid people must be led by the nose-ring because they will never 'understand.'"
It is left to us to prove they are wrong (for which election evidence has not been persuasive).
Libs also think those below themselves economically or racially are stupid. There’s a whole lot of people out there who feel superior. Even middle class libs have that problem.
It’s mind-numbingly SCARY to see how true this is becoming! Rules for thee and not me!
Here in FL, the landscape has changed with COVID. Prices surged and enjoyment diminished. The little villages often were overrun by the fleeing pandemic victims of the north. They came with their big sacks of money and bid any price to settle. They didn't buy into the culture and way of life; they peddled THEIR ways, gentrifying as they went. A place like Boca Grande is empty of its generation of natives because it got too expensive; so, they live away and drive to work now. We hear that there's a reversal now: too hot, too humid, and too many hurricanes! Ok then, go home to Mamdami and Pritzer and fix your own state!
It's like Biden's border crisis in microcosm.
Yes like toddlers "it wasn't me". Don't we have libraries full of commie stories. Perhaps a membership would help them!
NC is my first choice cuz the grands are in Asheville, but Tenn looks awful good with no income tax! (Johnson City is just before the NC line…. 🥴)
Stay out of the Asheville city limits at very least and even Buncombe County. The local politics are captured and will never change. The mayor is an idiot. She refuses to re-hire a bunch of cops who retired early or left a few years back. In the thirteen years we've been in the area, we watched the beautiful downtown deteriorate bigtime. The smart money is now moving out of the city. We just moved from Arden over closer to Hendersonville. The Johnson City area is nice.
Yep, smells like urine and weed, like most cities now.
My son was one of the engineers who were affected when ThermoFisher announced they are closing the Asheville location (I wonder why) but providentially God arranged for them to stay, he’s now working in Arden! Small world!
Marlene: Ashville is beautiful, as you prob know, but very liberal, and expensive. J.C. would be a better choice, imo. Same beautiful country with lower cost of living.
Even far-left older liberals I know left Asheville 5 years ago, it’s bad.
Good luck with that!
We never thought we would leave Virginia, but now I thank God that we did, 20 years ago.
And some states like Maine track you and hunt you down if you leave the state and take up citizenship in another state and keep the home there for renting. They track your moves and if you spend one day over 6 months in Maine you owe the ungodly amount of State income taxes. I hear California and Illinois are even worse.
I'm jealous. My husband refuses to leave our high tax state because he's so attached to our house. And the irony is that soon we may have to sell it because our property taxes go up every year (to support a failed public school system) while our retirement income does not.
Fair point, yet what a state gives up in property tax they claw back in other areas. My BIL moved out if NC into VA bc the money grab from his hard won retirement savings was higher in NC than VA. My point (and Jenna's too I think) is that government is going to take our money as creatively as they can so that the big fat middle we belong to continues to fund their bloated carcasses and hopefully we don't notice or if we do can's move easily out of one state to another
NC is way better for our tax situation all around. Income and property.
True statement, right there.
I moved from Maine to WV and pay half the taxes at least. My property taxes went from $6800 to $3600 and we have a much nicer home here and the personal property taxes are less also. AND no tax on SS and I am retired and that makes a huge difference.
PBD and Tom recently discussed this on an episode of his podcast. Their biggest point?
The ultra-rich are not nearly as tied to manufacturing (physical factories) as they were decades ago. I cannot remember exact numbers, but the point was that it is far easier for "The Rich" to leave and move somewhere else today than in decades past. In other words, wealth is far more mobile than it used to be.
In that same episode, they discussed the trillions that have already left CA and the landslide of trillions getting ready to leave because they put the 5% wealth tax on the ballot for November.
I was discussing this very topic years ago with a friend who manages a flooring mill. He said something that sticks with me to this day... "Have you ever tried working for a poor person?"
Great post, Russell. Love the point about mobility of wealth (dot.com wealth?) now vs decades ago.
Maybe add "Have you ever tried working for a Socialist?" You can't; rich or poor, they don't employ anyone.
The wealth tax is particularly bad because it taxes 5% of one's net worth.
Anyone in business knows any number of professions or careers (around here it might be loggers / saw millers, or ranchers) that have a huge amount of product pass thru their businesses (very large gross income), but the margins (net income) are relatively small.
Don't get me wrong, these people are not destitute -- they do OK for themselves. But they do not live like they're rich. Their net worth is tied up in land, equipment, and/or facilities -- non-liquid assets. Coming up with 5% of their net worth would DEVASTATE many of them.
PBD and crew discussed this as well. A rancher might be forced to sell land to pay the wealth tax, incurring a significant capital gains tax along the way. And then he cannot raise as many cattle. A vicious cycle of theft and multi-generational destruction.
Socialism is a scourge. FUBAR!
Great point. When I first read about these bozos (I'm being far too kind using such a fun and friendly term for them!) were targeting net worth and not income...I had the same reaction as you! This is a new game, a much more deadly game.
Grain farmers are in the same bind as ranchers. Their ‘on paper’ wealth does not reflect the reality of trying to make enough surplus money to pay taxes, employ reliable help (with benefits), and maintain/replace equipment costing $.5M and up.
Yes, my people are all Kansas farmers.
One of the big ironies is that most socialist leaders/zealots like Mamdani grew up as a rich nepo baby. Like Thomas Sowell said, “The offspring of privilege have dominated the leadership of Marxist movements from the days of Marx and Engels through Lenin, Mao, Castro, Ho Chi Minh, and their lesser counterparts around the world and down through history. The sheer reiteration of the "working class" theme in Marxism has drowned out this plain fact.”
Do people really think the Mamdanis of world will bring their child to “free” day care or shop in government stores?
So, Please Mess with the Zohran: https://lizlasorte.substack.com/p/please-mess-with-the-zohran?r=76q58
Almost every liberal state has private elite education for their children and nannies that raise them, along with private drivers and security.
Mamdani and his smug little wife are rich. Will they be paying exorbitant taxes or will there be loopholes?
Loopdeloops like Newscum
Madmani, because he IS!
When pressed on how, in the face of overwhelming evidence that socialism does not work, that it leads only to poverty, millions of deaths and destruction as evidenced by much of the past century, people can still believe in it, Milei reflected: “Because socialism is a sickness of the soul worse than the very worst cancer. When it is implemented completely, economically, politically, you get 150 million deaths. The worst dictators of the past century, they were all socialist.”
- Javier Milei
Go Argentina!
😂
I haven’t watched one minute of World Cup soccer, but I am 💯 supporting Argentina over the socialist Spain!
I’m unsure. It does seem like they feed off each other though. They seem to have a lot in common of basically screwing the working productive class for the benefit of the elite non-productive class (eg. Bolshevik leaders). Both policies work until they run out of other people’s money.
Seems to me the Bolshevik Communists gave, and continue to give, the Socialists real competition for the group that has done and continues to do the most slaughter and destruction.
Isn’t socialism the gateway drug of communism?
I can’t wait until NYC fully implodes. But will the broke-ass progressives learn a lesson?
Also, rich people moving south: leave your politics up north and bring only your money and common sense. That is all.
Same!
Frankly I don’t care about their money. That’s what NY and CA and IL care about. I just care about their common sense. Money will naturally flow from that.
💯
Puh-leeeeez!
"We’re talking about a system that historically produces food shortages, forced labor, censorship, wealth confiscation, economic stagnation, mass surveillance, and widespread, government-induced famine."
Sure. But it also it is also going to produce "equity." You can eat equity, right?
You can, but you might not like it. Farmers’ fields are actually full of it.
Just find the biggest cow he has, stand behind it (about 10’ so you don’t get kicked), and wait for the twitching that means the tail is about to lift. That’s how you know the equity is coming.
Bovine scatology.
Saw a recent AI generated video of a leopard or other big cat animal holding on to the tail area of a hippo as it's trying to escape.
Then an explosive blast of diarrhea comes out, spraying the predator in the face. It reacts, flipping over high in the air, the front covered with crap, and gagging pretty badly.
The video then goes on to show a woman, closeup, braying like a donkey, laughing and saying "Did you see the look on its face? AHAHAHAHA!!" (cackling) The guy next to her leaves, because.. Can you see the look on the woman's face?
The irony is hilarious.
I think this is the link. (I don't have an Instagram account. Hopefully someone has the link to it on another platform)
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DZnv6i2SivC/?igsh=MTc4MmM1YmI2Ng==
I feel so empty when I watch any video or music AI generated…
😂
Socialism can't make everyone equal, but it can make vast masses of people equally miserable.
“The power to tax is the power to destroy.” – John Marshall
“To compel a man to furnish funds for the propagation of ideas he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.” – Thomas Jefferson
I yearn for a second, bloodless, revolution, always hoped-for by Jefferson, but I fear that "If we ever return to a government we can 'afford,' America may not be able to defend herself from the superpower communists seeking pastures greener than the ones they've despoiled."
I wish I could see a path that left us well defended, but stripped of all the bloat of Socialists' "programs."
I blame the Socialist incubators, known as "schools." I'd start reforms there, reintroducing the theme of the (great) "melting pot," and replacing Socialist "ideals" with what-our-ancestors-exuded: self-reliance, innovation, patriotism, belief in the Christian God, and tolerance (which is not to say blind acceptance).
The problem seems to be that, in a democracy especially, but even in a republic, freedom is always only a few "election cycles" away from disappearing forever.
EDIT: In a way, Trump was that "bloodless revolution", except for the lunatics bent on assassination, and I remember before him there was the Tea Party movement. Both seemed to come out of nowhere, surprising the status quo which tried and failed to eliminate them. Wish someone would study these phenomena and explain how to trigger the next ones.
I saw a video yesterday saying that the Chinese real estate market has crashed, and lots of empty apartments are standing. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e_Pfx7oFZyo)
Why don't we send people who hate America there, and fill up those apartments?
I'm feeling particularly charitable today with other people's property.
Because empty apartments need rent-payers, and rent-payers means job-havers.
Since America-hating socialists aren’t job-havers, they can’t be rent-payers, so even Chyna doesn’t want their sniveling, worthless asses.
They are the very definition of useless eaters until we implement the Soylent Green protocol, when they will finally achieve their purpose.
I don't know, MK, communists appreciate "value" in propaganda, so there may be something to Justin's idea of the red b*st*rds hosting an emigre' commune of worthless, sniveling, socialist, former-American asses. (They'll accept the skimpiest of rations, and Thank the State! for it.)
I’m not saying don’t try to send them, I’m just doubting Chyna wants them. Although the CCP does have more persuasive methods to make people comply than we do…
I think that's only fair.
I saw a while back an interview with a Chinese woman saying they have vastly overstated their current population size. She reviews the number when Mao came to power and the one child policy and said to get to where they say they are today the births per female would have to be almost 5. Could somewhat explain the empty apartments.
If the Association for Alliterative Accomplishment gives prizes for outstanding and inventive alliteration, this phrase should win the gold: "after years of watching flush Frenchies flee with their fortunes." Yowzer!
Bahahahaha it's a serious sickness. ;)
No, not a sickness; it's a serious word scholar showing off her ability to play with words. I LOVE it!
But one with which we ALL wish to be infected. Every now and then I have an outbreak. 😆
I’ve got to hear the cute boy in the kayak story, pretty please. And I’ve gotta know who chose “sensible and just”.
In 1997 I moved from NYC to LA. I went out as a west coast editor for MLLE but was hired on staff at Shape, which was based in LA. The first week there I got invited to go kayaking in Santa Barbara. I didn't know what a kayak was or where Santa Barbara was, so of course I said yes. Hahaha but actually. My (now) hubby was the guide. Dated long distance (2 hours) for a while, and since his biz was based in SB and I could freelance from anywhere, I moved to SB. (In another post I'll tell you about the "kayaccident" that happened that day, which is mostly the reason we're together today. Hint: I WAS FROM NYC. Hardly the sporty, athletic type LOL.)
I had a feeling...! ❤️🔥
Two hours is "long distance"? Oh Jenna... try "other side of the country" or "Europe"... now that's a long distance relationship (especially when the Internet was brand new).
I mean, we weren't going to get married without ever living in the same town! We had different friends, different lives, different routines. We both had pets we had to leave to spend a weekend together. There was no "you free for lunch?" It's different! :)
Ah, but those were the days when real relationships actually happened!
Oh dear, blending pets could be a challenge! As for weekends away from the pets... that's why cats rock! They are wonderfully independent.
Haha. 2 hour plus drive can be a daily jaunt in Montana.
That's sort of my thought here in South Dakota. Anything within two hours is "local".
Even in the Twin Cities (Minnesota), the "other side of the city" was a one hour drive (assuming you avoided rush hour).
got ya'll beat, since my beloved is 10 hours (in a plane) away. I would love for it to only be 10 hours in a car! that would be wonderful. other side of the country would be sooooo much better than other side of the freakin' world. but yeah, without the Internet, never would have 'met' in the first place. so there's that...
The greatest illiteracy among commies might be how much the rich actually pay in taxes. Yes they have lawyers and accountants to minimize the damage and find loopholes, but that generally only lowers their payments by several percentage points…which in the game of billionaires could be tens of millions of dollars and more than covers the cost of the accountants that you and I can’t afford.
Somehow these nitwits think the rich have some magic loophole that lets them pay nothing, rather than the actual loophole that lets them avoid a ridiculous 37% tax rate, which btw starts at $640k. There is no special rate above that for say $10M or even $1B.
Meanwhile, I’m still pissed that Pennsylvania insisted on collecting 4% of my father in law’s estate just for him to have the privilege of dying. TN repealed their inheritance taxes in 2016, because nothing says take your money and retire somewhere else like a high inheritance tax.
The inheritance tax is nothing but a rip off. It is absolute robbery. You work hard your whole life so that your progeny can have a little nest out of their own, maybe a little financial security in a world gone mad, and the state wants to take it. I say fuck the state. I’m currently in Virginia and I definitely say fuck Virginia. Trying really hard to get out of here right now.
I lived in Caroline County in ‘97 and then Stafford County in ‘03. When I moved to TN in ‘07, those bastards had the gall to send me a car tax bill for ‘08 and the part of ‘07 that I didn’t live there.
I sent them the copy of their code that specified who was eligible for car tax instead and never heard back.
I’m not surprised. Virginia will literally tax the air that you breathe. And I do believe that most of our state is red. I’ve been here. My whole life lived in various parts of the state. Family everywhere. I sincerely do not believe that scam Berger was duly elected. Fake election all the way.
unfortunately, you have Spanberger working there.
Exactly. She’s former CIA, what more do you need to know? That whole election was a scam 100%.
Indeed.
I got a lotta reasons why I read Jenna - the memes, the common sense understandable lay-it-all-out-there blogging style, but the number one reason I read Jenna is I can HEAR her talking as I read her stack. One for instance - (Maybe they have nicer running shoes HAHAHAHA!) I’m already laughing typing this. Another that I can’t unhear in my head - “Kansas has the largest ball of twine……..I mean WHYYYYY?) LMAO.
Seriously, the sentence contained in the meme that encapsulates her “Everyman” views was this - “The Altruism is Merely Performative.” Isn’t that the truth, tho. The 1 percent has aspirations to my nickel and to use it to be the ruling class. I am so outta NY.
DAY MADE, friend! :)
Awwww - that’s the other reason - you’re so gosh darned NICE! ☺️
😭🩷
Standup... I'm telling you! (OK, asking... pretty please?)
I’d pay to attend that!
Same!
Precisely, Marlene! Somehow Jenna manages to take a very depressing topic and transforms it into something altogether different and LOL hilarious 😆.
Don’t get me wrong. The sheer devastation happening in Cali and NY is real and hideous, but it’s also weirdly disturbing and funny!
It’s her superpower!
Move back to Kansas!!!
Kansas is having problems of its own now. We desperately need a Republican governor and do not need any more progressive “performative” types moving here.
I am def a chatty Cathy this am. Can’t be Ks, tho - when would I ever see my grands!?!! Gotta be NC or Tenn. (Which has no income tax. BTW. Jus sayin’…)
“Gimmeville”, aptly named for a socialist utopia. Stealing this one! Great article!
Here I am again, trying to understand who voted “sensible and just”.
I said the same thing, Laura. Maybe they didn’t sleep well and their coffee hasn’t kicked in.
Most likely someone whose thumb slipped. That’s my hope for humanity.
Everyone is moving to those states that are terrible, according to the media. LOL Tennessee number one with their zero state income tax. https://www.cnbc.com/2026/07/11/worst-states-to-live-in-america-2026.html
Trying to figure how TN raises dough with no income tax, I was reminded of the great SNL skit about "First Citiwide Change Bank"--"with locations conveniently near toll plazas"--where, "when you come in, if you give me a ten, I can give you two fives, or a five and five ones or... we WORK with the customer!" A bank official was asked, "So, your business model is that your bank 'just makes change??' How do you make any money?"
The completely unforgettable answer, "One word: Volume!"
9.25% sales tax and 15% “liquor by the drink” tax, which has gotten quite the workout lately. 🍻
Husband and I will do well. We hate shopping and gave up alcohol.
In a word: "Volume!"
Flat tax. As a professional before retirement my observation is our tax code is a mire of loop holes. As a business owner it was disheartening to see over half of the profit gone. There were years that we questioned whether we would be better off just closing and letting some one else carry the risk, work our 40 hours, and have a life outside the business. What kept us going? All the people who depended on their paychecks. The business wasn’t just us. It was staff’s mortgages, kids schools, medical insurance for spouses that were ill, it was not who wants to be a millionaire.
I know this is crazy, but a Flat tax, a balanced budget, and prioritize a distribution of the excess to citizen support systems that verify the recipient’s eligibility (information from tax filing) rather than funding countries outside our borders. This doesn’t mean I feel global responsibility isn’t valid. But you need to care for the system at home before we care for those outside.
Cherylann, you are not the first business owner I know of who felt the weight of their loyal employees finances on their shoulders. Your family's sacrifice brings new meaning for me to the words "business class." Your points are well spoken and taken.
Totally agree. Money goes where it's treated best. Always has and always will. Both metaphorically and literally. As it turns out, greed and envy don't pay the bills. But they sell, I guess. 💕