High property and sales taxes can absolutely offset a low income tax, if you’re a person who owns property (which most established NHL players do).
Texas has FAR higher property taxes than California. And there’s no “jock tax” effect to this… the Stars players who own homes there are paying full freight on that rate, regardless how many days a year they actually spend there.
The map of sales taxes in the USA is probably not what people think it is.
https://taxfoundation.org/wp-conten...ates-2022-state-and-local-sales-tax-rates.png
One of the deeply deceptive political dynamics in the USA is the idea that tax burdens are radically different between states. In reality they’re almost all within a range of about 5% of each other at the state and local level, and federal taxes are consistent across the board, so the overall tax burden across states is only minimally different. The
political difference is that some places tout a lack of income tax, justified behind the principle of “small government” (which translates to poor public services). In reality, they’re medium-tax environments which simply don’t have good public services.