You said:
> When I was living in NYC I paid 39% federal + 13.5% state/city - that’s over 50%
According to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Income_tax_in_the_United_State... you earn >$400k a year? If so you shouldn't have any problems in NY.
If you do make $100k, you'd be way better off in Texas: https://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/compare_cities.jsp?cou...
In other words, we're comparing apples to apples here.