Connecticut has a problem no one in Hartford seems willing to name plainly: we are taxing our residents and businesses into leaving.

The state income tax — introduced in 1991 over fierce public opposition — has grown steadily ever since. What was sold as a stabilizing measure became a permanent drag on every household and business in the state. The evidence isn’t abstract. People are voting with their feet. Between 2010 and 2020, Connecticut was one of the few states in the nation to lose population. The wealthy leave first, then the businesses that employed their neighbors, then the neighbors themselves.

The case against the income tax is both principled and compassionate. Money earned belongs to the person who earned it. When government takes less, individuals and families decide how to allocate their own resources — saving, investing, spending locally. All of those outcomes beat feeding a state bureaucracy whose track record of resource allocation is, to put it charitably, unimpressive. And lower taxes aren’t a gift to the wealthy — they’re a recognition that the working family in Bridgeport and the small business owner in Torrington deserve to keep more of what they earn just as much as anyone else.

The obvious question is how. Connecticut can’t eliminate the income tax overnight. But that’s precisely the right conversation to force — what does the state actually need to do, and what has it taken on that properly belongs to individuals, communities, and the private sector? Reduce rates, eliminate exemptions that favor the well-connected, and commit to a glide path toward elimination. Remove the obstacles that prevent people from contributing to the state’s economic health on their own terms.

Connecticut was once one of the most prosperous states in the nation. Prosperity won’t be taxed into existence. It has to be earned — and for that to happen, the people doing the earning need to be trusted with the fruits of their work.

We can still do this.