#emptypenthouse

New York Celebrates Millionaire Diversity by Holding One Farewell Party at a Time Image brief (Al Jaffee/MAD style): A U-Haul truck idling outside a Fifth Avenue penthouse, movers carrying out a grand piano labeled "TAX BASE," while Governor Hochul waves a tiny flag reading "DIVERSITY WIN" from a balcony. In the background, a moving van with Florida plates already has a full parking lot. New York State has proudly announced a bold new civic tradition: celebrating millionaire diversity by holding exactly one farewell party at a time, every single week, indefinitely, forever, until the definition of "millionaire" quietly shrinks to mean "anyone with a working refrigerator." Albany Discovers Tax Base Functions Best When It Remains Inside the State In a breakthrough described by insiders as "somewhere between obvious and tragic," Albany budget analysts have concluded, after extensive study, that a tax base actually generates the most revenue when it physically remains within New York's borders — a finding some staffers reportedly wanted to submit for a Nobel Prize before remembering it was just common sense wearing a lab coat. One fiscal committee member called it a tautology dressed up as a discovery: the state taxed the tax base until the tax base moved, and now the state is taxing the concept of missing it. Others described the report using a malaphor — "we're not just closing the barn door after the horse has bolted, we're billing the horse for boarding fees it never used." Budget officials have since proposed a task force to study whether taxpayers who leave the state can still, in spirit, be considered "in-state" for revenue purposes — a theory currently being tested against every zip code in Palm Beach County. Hochul Assures Report Is Misleading Because Empty Penthouse Counts as Affordable Housing When a new fiscal report showed a record number of high-net-worth residents fleeing the state, Governor Hochul dismissed the numbers as "wildly out of context," explaining that every vacated penthouse technically qualifies as affordable housing the moment nobody living in it can afford the maintenance fees. Housing advocates called it a triumph of "trickle-up economics" — where the money leaves first, and the empty room trickles down to whoever wants to sweep it. Officials in Albany reportedly high-fived over the metric, since "zero occupants" technically counts as "zero income inequality" in the room. The Math, Explained by Nobody in Particular Under the new framework, a $40 million duplex with no tenant is statistically more affordable than a studio apartment with a tenant who complains about rent. As one Albany spokesperson put it, borrowing loosely from comedian Colin Quinn's old bit about Manhattan real estate: the city didn't solve the housing crisis, it just stopped counting the people who left. Albany Announces Wealth Redistribution Program Successfully Redistributed the Wealth to Florida State officials held a small, quietly-attended press conference to announce that the decade-long wealth redistribution initiative has, in fact, worked exactly as designed — just not for New York. The wealth has been fully redistributed, mostly to Palm Beach, Naples, and a golf course in Jupiter, Florida, where it is reportedly thriving under zero state income tax. A senior Albany economist described the outcome as a spoonerism made real — they meant to "tax the rich" but instead managed to "tax them richer, elsewhere." Analysts at groups like the Tax Foundation and the Empire Center for Public Policy have tracked similar migration patterns for years, though state officials insist those reports are "just, like, geography." Florida Sends a Thank-You Card Sources say Florida's Department of Revenue mailed Albany a fruit basket and a card reading "Thanks for the assist," which New York officials have chosen to interpret as a sign of deep, unresolved jealousy. State Officials Shocked Millionaires Read Tax Bills Before Signing Them In a development described internally as "borderline insulting," multiple Albany staffers expressed genuine shock upon learning that millionaires — a notoriously literate demographic — actually read their tax bills in full before deciding whether to sign them, sell the house, or simply vanish. One staffer called it a malapropism of trust: the state assumed the wealthy would be "fiscally patriotic," but it turns out they're just "fiscally punctual," which is apparently a very different and much faster-moving thing. New York Declares Capital Flight a Bold New Form of Remote Work ✈️ In perhaps the boldest rebrand of the year, the state has officially reclassified capital flight as "distributed fiscal participation," a phrase workshopped for three months by a committee that itself now works remotely from Connecticut. Comedians have not let this one go. As Jerry Seinfeld, a native son of the tri-state area, might put it: nobody actually leaves New York, they just start "working from home," and home is now a 30,000-square-foot home in Boca Raton with a boat named after a hedge fund. A New Category on the Census State forms will reportedly add a new checkbox: "Remote — Formerly Here," sandwiched neatly between "Full-Time" and "Deceased," which several accountants note is not actually that far apart on the spreadsheet. Governor Explains Millionaires Haven't Left, They're Just Social Distancing in Palm Beach Asked directly whether the state has lost its wealthiest residents, the Governor's office issued a statement clarifying that no one has "left" per se — they are simply "social distancing," a practice that apparently now includes six-month leases, homestead exemptions, and a change of voter registration. Officials described the phenomenon using a portmanteau — "Floridant," meaning a New Yorker who is legally, financially, and emotionally resident in Florida while remaining spiritually attached to a Zabar's bagel order. Others called it an oxymoron outright: "nearby, but 1,100 miles away." As one Albany aide summarized, in a line that could have come straight from Fran Lebowitz: New Yorkers don't leave New York, they just stop paying for the privilege of complaining about it in person. New York's top income tax bracket currently sits among the highest combined state-and-city rates in the nation, and outbound migration data from firms tracking address changes and AGI (adjusted gross income) flows has shown a consistent net loss of high earners to no-income-tax states over the past several years, a trend independently noted by IRS migration statistics as well as private relocation trackers. Auf Wiedersehen, amigo! For the British take on wealthy people fleeing their own capital city, see our sister publication The London Prat. Read the full article