In a 1978 speech, Zoltan Merszei, who served as President and CEO of Dow Chemical Co. until his retirement in 1979, said the following in a speech to the Empire Club of Canada: “A fact of life is that money is a coward. Money crosses national boundaries freely. Investment capital will not flow down a hazardous, unlit street where the risk is visibly higher than the potential reward. Money has no national loyalty. Like poker chips, money has no permanent home.”

High tax states are seeing the reality of Merszei’s apt metaphor as people with high incomes are fleeing in record numbers. The following is from The Washington Free Beacon:

“New Jersey’s high taxes may be costing the state billions of dollars a year in lost revenue as high-earning residents flee, according to a recent study.

“The study, Exodus on the Parkway, was completed by Regent Atlantic last year but held for publication until after the November 2013 elections. The study stated it ‘intentionally’ held its results ‘as 2014 is not an election year for state legislators’ and it will ‘hopefully encourage a serious and objective dialogue aimed at addressing and solving the challenges that New Jersey currently faces.’

“The study shows the state has been steadily losing high-net-worth residents since 2004, when Democratic Gov. Jim McGreevey signed the millionaire’s tax into law. The law raised the state income tax 41 percent on those earning $500,000 or more a year.

“‘The inception of this tax, coupled with New Jersey’s already high property and estate taxes, leaves no mystery about why the term “tax migration” has become a buzzword among state residents and financial, legal, and political professionals,’ the study, conducted by Regent states.

“Democrats in New Jersey have been pushing for even higher taxes on the wealthy in recent years. They have failed three times to raise the millionaire’s tax even higher than McGreevey did under threat of a veto by Governor Chris Christie.”

Read more: Washington Free Beacon