Massachusetts has long been held up by liberals as a blue state that works. It’s a liberal state for sure – nicknamed “Taxachusetts” – but for a long time, it operated with a fairly modest flat rate income tax.

But now the Boston Globe is asking “Is Massachusetts losing its economic mojo?” after decades of being a leader in medicine, biotech, and university research.

Globe columnist Larry Edelman notes that last year’s passage of a “millionaires tax” – a 4 percentage point surcharge on incomes over $1 million – may be chasing wealthy residents out. (We warned of this, of course.) Adding to the exodus is the most punitive estate tax in the country, kicking in at a threshold of $1 million, compared to the federal government’s $13 million.

A new study by the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation shows the state’s labor force has declined by 100,000 workers since 2019.  Massachusetts was one of the birthplaces of the tech movement with MIT located in Boston, but even tech jobs are leaving for low-tax states like Texas and Florida. Massachusetts lost 2,200 jobs in computer systems design in the last three years, while Texas added 77,000 jobs and Florida gained 31,000.