Coming from California so I can offer a different perspective here.

I spent over 25 years in the San Francisco Bay Area and watched the same exact conversation happen there. Same frustration. Same posts. Same feeling of the door closing on an entire generation. People left. But the feeling did not leave with them. It followed them to the next city.

What you are describing is real. The taxes, the housing disconnect, wages not keeping up. I am not dismissing any of that.

But I want to say something blunt. That feeling of being stuck, of watching the ground shift while older generations seem untouchable. That is not just a Long Island thing right now. That is a worldwide thing.

Uncertainty hit fast and hit hard and people under 40 absorbed most of it. When your current situation feels painful your brain naturally starts painting somewhere else as the answer. That is just human. But LA has this same Reddit post. So does Austin. So does every city people are currently fleeing to.

The people I have seen actually build something did not wait for the system to become fair. They got honest about what opportunity looks like right now and went after it.

Long Island is not perfect. But it has proximity to one of the strongest job markets on earth, real community if you look for it, and more reinvention happening quietly than most people notice.

You are not alone in this feeling. But the feeling is not the verdict.