The New Politics of Resentment

By Ryan J. Owens

Sunday, May 31, 2026

 

A new wave of class-baiters and grievance politicians have shown how deeply economic liberty is under attack in parts of America. We should be alarmed because economic liberty is not merely about economics; it is about human flourishing.

 

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani recently filmed a “tax the rich” video outside the Manhattan residence of Ken Griffin, founder of Citadel. His message was clear — that wealth creators are villains. Griffin rightly called the stunt “creepy weird.” He could have added “dangerous” and “economically destructive.”

 

On the other side of the country, Seattle Mayor Katie Wilson mocked concerns that wealthy residents and businesses will flee Washington’s new “millionaire tax” and take their jobs with them, stating: “I think the claims that millionaires are going to leave our state are, like, super overblown. And if — the ones that leave, like, bye.”

 

These attitudes from leaders of some of the nation’s largest cities are not merely juvenile; they are immoral, self-defeating, and profoundly economically illiterate.

 

America rests on the idea that citizens are and ought to be free to rise through hard work and risk-taking. That’s what “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” is all about. If you’re confused as to why, go ask a former Soviet, Cuban, or Venezuelan.

 

Frederick Douglass understood all this. The former slave explained the liberation he felt when, at last, he earned wages for his work: “To understand the emotion which swelled my heart as I clasped this money, realizing that I had no master who could take it from me — that it was mine — that my hands were my own” affected him in ways few Americans today can comprehend.

 

Every dollar the government spends comes out of your pocket. Every “free” item provided by the state comes courtesy of a taxpayer who has a job and a family to support. When government treats private success as public property, it tears the fabric of liberty.

 

The new politics of resentment characterized by the statements of Mamdani and Wilson wrongly asserts that if one person succeeds, another must fail. Imagine telling a professional athlete he has become too skilled and must intentionally perform worse to preserve “fairness.” Imagine telling a student that the reason she should not receive an A is that she studied harder than everyone else.

 

Prosperity is not a zero-sum game. Innovation begets innovation and reward. When wealth grows broadly, jobs are created.

 

Of course, some taxation is necessary. Roads must be built. Courts must function. Public safety matters. But there is an enormous moral difference between taxation that sustains basic government operation and taxation that is driven by resentment and entitlement.

 

Resentment politics are also economically self-defeating.

 

Whether large or small, governments cannot operate without a solid and sustainable tax base. To establish such a tax base, you must first incentivize people to invest their time and resources into economy-growing endeavors. How do you do that? Return money to the people who take those risks and make those investments. By pushing companies like Citadel out of state, cities such as New York and Seattle have engaged in a remarkable act of self-immolation. They are stripping their own people of sustainable tax revenue.

 

Resentment politics and populism also make for bad economic policy.

 

People respond to incentives. When individuals are free to innovate and to keep a meaningful share of what they earn, prosperity grows. Individuals generally allocate resources more efficiently than centralized government planners. Families know their needs better than bureaucracies do.

 

The evidence is increasingly difficult to ignore.

 

Between 2020 and 2024, hundreds of thousands of Americans migrated from high-tax states such as New York, Illinois, and California to lower-tax states such as Florida and Texas. Florida alone gained roughly 1.2 million residents from domestic migration over the past decade. Meanwhile, New York lost about 1.9 million residents during that same period.

 

Citadel moved its headquarters from Chicago to Miami in 2022. Goldman Sachs expanded heavily in South Florida in 2021. Technology firms and financial services companies have increasingly relocated employees and investment activity away from high-tax, heavily regulated states. This movement of capital (and philanthropy) has followed the movement of people because incentives matter.

 

Where other states impose punitive taxes, Florida has no state income tax. Where other states strangle business with regulations, Florida enjoys a favorable regulatory environment (with some room for improvement). And where other states single out hard working, successful people like Ken Griffin, Florida’s culture admires entrepreneurship.

 

Other states should pay attention. Because in the long run, people — and prosperity — tend to flow toward places that offer economic liberty.