Albany

New York isn't just losing lots of people who each week depart for places like Florida, North Carolina or Arizona. The state is also bleeding money.

The story of people fleeing the Empire State for warmer and lower-tax states is an old one.

But a new study shows how New York escapees are also taking their money with them when they leave.

When it comes to the out-migration of income, New York leads the nation by a wide margin.

The Empire State saw a staggering $45.6 billion in income leave for other states between 2000 and 2010, according to a study by the Tax Foundation, a nonpartisan research group. The loss outpaced even California, which lost $29.4 billion, and Illinois, where $20.4 billion was lost over the same 10-year period.

The biggest winner between 2000 and 2010 was Florida, which gained net of $67.3 billion dollars in annual income reported by people who had moved there from other states.

In second place was Arizona, at $17.7 billion, and Texas with $17.6 billion.

The Tax Foundation came up with their winners and losers by looking at Internal Revenue Service data linked to Social Security numbers to track the number of income tax filers who moved from one state to another.

They then factored in the reported incomes from the filings.

The map doesn't say whether a state's overall population is growing or shrinking or whether the total amount of aggregate income in a given state is up or down.

But it's an indicator of how states are doing compared to one another.

That $45.6 billion in inflation-adjusted dollars that left for New York, for example, represents money that probably would have stayed in the state during the 2000s had those people stayed put.

Income can come from a number of sources such as salaries, pensions, business profits or investments.

"This is the IRS's raw data," said Nick Kasprak, the Foundation analyst who put together the map.

The findings don't mean that New York's population has shrunk — in fact, it's grown slightly due to immigration from other countries.

Nor has the net income dropped since the turn of the 21st century.

More Information Money migration To see how each state did, go to interactive.taxfoundation.org/migration. Winners and losers, interstate migration and the income that followed the moving vans between 2000 and 2010: Winners Florida +$67.3 billion Arizona +$17.7 billion Texas +$17.6 billion Losers New York-$45.6 billion California-$29.4 billion Illinois-$20.4 billion. Source: Tax Foundation See More Collapse

Lots of stories have been written about how New Yorkers each week leave the state for places where the property and school taxes are lower and the climate is warmer.

But the Tax Foundation's survey offers no reason why so many taxpaying New Yorkers left between 2000 and 2010.

The organization put out other surveys in the past showing that New York, especially upstate, has the nation's highest property taxes as a percentage of a home's value.

The Cuomo administration pointed out that the survey runs through 2010, before the governor took office. Nor does the migration map suggest that New York is headed for the collective poor house anytime soon.

Frank Mauro of the labor-backed Fiscal Policy Institute notes that the net amount of income earned in New York rose a bit faster than the nation as a whole, despite the out-migration. That income probably came from Wall Street profits.

"New York is growing slower (than the rest of the nation) but overall, we're more prosperous," he said.

rkarlin@timesunion.com • 518-454-5758 • @RickKarlinTU