supernemovitosti

America's richest people are all moving south! What gets them there?

Well…there are actually two things that attract the wealthy to head to the lower latitudes: warm weather and low taxes.

Yes, according to the IRS, that's where most of America's money is headed now.

Take for instance Collier County, Florida. This county includes the city of Naples. Average income there went up to more than $75,000 per person – that's $300,000 for a family of four! Most families who moved into Collier County actually came from other parts of Florida like Lee, Miami Dade, Broward and Palm Beach. However, northern parts of the country also sent some of their folks to Collier like Cook County, Illinois (where Chicago is), Oakland, Michigan (near Detroit) and Suffolk County, New York (in Long Island).

Then we have Greene County in Georgia. Almost 800 people moved there in 2008 probably because it's close to Atlanta. Average income in this county went up to more than $56,000 per capita. Ten percent of those who moved in actually came from Georgia, too.

Other places where the rich folks move into are Nassau County and Walton County in Florida, and Llano County, Texas near Austin.

While we can easily understand people's preference for warmer climates as a significant factor that makes them move south, we should not neglect the fact also that both Florida and Texas have no income taxes. Texas also boasts of the fourth lowest property tax rates, while Florida comes in eighth.

Where are these people coming from? Well, they're mostly from Maryland, California and Connecticut — states that are among those that have the highest tax burdens.