‘If they start moving entire companies, panic’: Hosts debate WA’s millionaire tax, wealth exodus

A recent column by Danny Westneat pointed out that even though major business leaders like Amazon’s Jeff Bezos have moved out of the state, many business leaders remain in Washington and are now making even more money than expected.

Ursula Reutin and Mike Lewis, co-hosts of “The Gee and Ursula Show” on KIRO Newsradio, discussed how company founders are leaving the state, largely in part because of taxes, but the state’s capital gains tax just reeled in a record high $1.5 billion this year, nearly tripling last year’s numbers.

“This is a tough one. What we’re hearing is that wealthy people are unhappy about the additional capital gains tax and other taxes that are going to come on in a couple of years, and they are getting out of the state to protect their wealth,” Lewis said. “The other end of it is that we’re collecting way more in capital gains taxes than we predicted, so clearly someone’s cashing in and paying it.

“Largely speaking about the billionaires and 100 millionaires who are purportedly, in some cases, actually moving away, I mean, for Jeff Bezos, it meant a tax saving of a billion dollars,” Lewis continued. “He’s got lots of billions, so he could have afforded to pay it, but for him, a much easier thing is just to change his residency, and then bing, done.”

Ursula worries the millionaire’s tax could eventually hit lower earners

Ursula raised concerns about the millionaire’s tax because she believed it could move further down the food chain and impact people earning under $1 million, since no guardrails have been put in place.

“I mean, a lot was made of the Howard Schultz move too, as if it happened immediately after this thing was passed, when in fact, it had been in the works for a while,” Ursula said. “That said, I’m not a big fan of this so-called millionaire’s tax, not because of who it affects, but more so that I don’t trust Governor Ferguson saying he won’t let it go below the threshold, when there have been no guardrails put in to make sure that is the case.”

Lewis explained that a few founders moving to preserve their wealth is more than OK and well within their rights, but also highlighted when the right time to panic is.

“If they start moving entire companies, panic,” Lewis said. “If they are just moving a couple of people in a C-suite to another, so they can preserve more of their personal wealth, fine,” Lewis said. “I disagree with Katie Wilson, don’t say the ‘bye’ thing, I thought that was tone deaf. But on the other hand, that has been their right. The funny thing is, before this tax, they were doing it then, too.

“I got hired from out of state,” Lewis continued. “I wasn’t given a wage increase from the newspaper job I had there to the newspaper job I got here. But they told me, in effect, you’re getting a raise because you’re not paying income tax here. People were recruited literally on that point to this day.”

Watch the full discussion in the video above.

Listen to Gee and Ursula on “The Gee and Ursula Show” weekday mornings from 9 am to 12 pm on KIRO Newsradio.