COMMENTARY: A recipe for making Nevada the envy of the nation

I love Nevada. It’s my adopted state for more than 15 years now. I spent the first 40 years of my life living in New York and California. Those are the high-tax places that people are running away from in droves.

Now add in Chicago. There aren’t enough moving vans to satisfy the demand for all the people running away from high-tax Illinois. In the past year, 114,000 citizens escaped from Illinois. The state is losing one resident every 4.6 minutes. That’s the fastest rate ever.

Since 2000, Illinois has lost the population of Joliet, Springfield, Peoria, Naperville, Elgin, Champaign, Arlington Heights, Rockford, Aurora and Waukegan combined.

There is no mistaking why this happened — and it’s not because of cold weather. This all happened at the same time and in response to a massive state income tax and sales and property tax increases. According to IRS data, that loss of population comes with a loss of $30,000 of taxable income every 4.6 minutes.

The state of Illinois is literally shrinking, starving and dying right in front of our eyes.

But Illinois is not alone. Pennsylvania is shrinking, too. And New York and California are losing even more total citizens each year than either Illinois or Pennsylvania.

This is where Nevada comes in. The people leaving those states are perfect for us — high income citizens, business owners and retirees. These are the exact kind of people we should be recruiting to Nevada.

These are people who don’t need a thing. They are people like me. I came to Nevada in 2002. I’ve paid many hundreds of thousands in sales taxes, property taxes, payroll taxes and fees for my many small businesses.

But I’ve taken nothing out of the state budget. As in nada, zero, zip. I don’t cost taxpayers a cent. I don’t collect welfare, food stamps, free health care, or even education (my kids are homeschooled).

I do nothing but contribute and pay in. I take nothing out.

Why don’t we recruit an army of taxpayers like that?

Here’s Nevada’s chance to double our state’s population with nothing but productive citizens. People who contribute, take nothing out, spend tons of money as consumers and start businesses that create jobs.

We can fill up our entire state with these kind of folks.

All we have to do is set aside a nice-sized chunk of change out of Nevada’s budget to advertise and promote our state to the residents of high-tax states. We need to aggressively advertise in New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Illinois and California.

We need ads starring a business owner who can say, “I spent my life in high tax states like New York and California, until I got smart and moved to Las Vegas. It was the best move of my life. In Nevada, my state income taxes, business income taxes, capital gains taxes and inheritance taxes are all zero. And my property taxes are among the lowest in America. I get to keep more of my own money to live a much higher quality of life. Throw in sunshine, warm weather, the best restaurants and entertainment in the world, light traffic compared to any other major city and legal sports betting — and this my friends is heaven. What are you waiting for? Every day you wait is costing you money, a better quality of life and a better life for your family.

“If you’re a business owner, high-income earner or a retiree, you owe it to yourself to explore a move to Nevada.”

Run that ad day and night in every high-tax state and Nevada gains all the best, brightest and richest business owners and retirees in America. We become the small-business capital and retiree capital of the country.

And we become one of the richest states in America. That’s how we make Nevada great.

Contact Wayne Allyn Root at Wayne@ROOTforAmerica.com). Hear his nationally syndicated “WAR Now: The Wayne Allyn Root Show” from 3 p.m. to 6 p.m. daily at 790 Talk Now.