Study: Connecticut near last in millionaire creation

The Empire Center for Public Policy studied the percentage increase of millionaire households between 2010 and 2015 in an analysis of Internal Revenue Service data covering those tax years. Click through to see the states that saw the least and most growth in millionaires. Click here to read more. less The Empire Center for Public Policy studied the percentage increase of millionaire households between 2010 and 2015 in an analysis of Internal Revenue Service data covering those tax years. Click through to ... more Photo: Greenwich Time Photo: Greenwich Time Image 1 of / 36 Caption Close Study: Connecticut near last in millionaire creation 1 / 36 Back to Gallery

Connecticut ranked next to last nationally for the rate at which it has added households reporting at least $1 million in annual income, according to a new study, which accounts for both blue bloods moving in as well as existing residents moving into the highest tax brackets.

The Empire Center for Public Policy studied the percentage increase of millionaire households between 2010 and 2015 — a period encompassing the recovery from the Great Recession — in an analysis of Internal Revenue Service data covering those tax years.

In 2015, the IRS determined Connecticut was home to nearly 11,500 taxpayers with adjusted gross income of $1 million or more that year, representing a 27 percent increase from 2010 when the IRS counted a little over 9,000 millionaires.

Though on the surface a sizable increase, Connecticut’s gain was in fact half the U.S. average — and among states ahead of only Louisiana, which mustered an 18 percent rise. Despite its moneyed Gold Coast enclaves in the southwestern portion of the state, Connecticut trailed states like Mississippi, Oklahoma and West Virginia for the addition of millionaire earners within its borders.

California led all states with a 72 percent gain in millionaire taxpayers, followed by Florida at 69 percent. Texas and Massachusetts were just above the average 55 percent increase nationally, with New Jersey seeing a 43 percent bump and New York 40 percent.

The report arrived even as Connecticut reels over the loss of another corporate headquarters, with Alexion Pharmaceuticals confirming Tuesday plans to move 400 executives and personnel to new offices in Boston near those of General Electric, on the heels of GE having relocated 200 senior managers there last year from its former headquarters in Fairfield. Next up is Aetna, which is designating New York City as its new headquarters as of 2018, where it will employ 250 people initially.

The three moves could further erode any future percentage gains in millionaire earners, with state Sen. L. Scott Frantz, R-Greenwich, and others fretting the past several years of what they see as an alarming number of billionaires ending residency in Connecticut.

“My neck of the woods down in southwestern Connecticut ... is an engine that provides a tremendous amount of revenues to the state of Connecticut,” Frantz said during a Connecticut General Assembly hearing in late July. “Business decision makers are looking very closely at what’s happening today.”

In preliminary tax collection data for the 2017 fiscal year, the Connecticut Department of Revenue Services tracked a $162 million decline in income taxes. If proving accurate in a final DRS analysis, that would represent a 1.9 percent drop from fiscal 2016 for total collections of just over $8.4 billion, representing just over half of the state’s total budget.

DRS also recorded a slight decline in preliminary collections for Connecticut’s gift and estate tax to $219 million, a levy that can swing significantly year to year and with the fiscal 2017 figure possibly subject to upward revision in the event of any estates reporting after the close of the fiscal year.

Alex.Soule@scni.com; 203-842-2545; @casoulman