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Governor Paterson will propose a mid-year cut in state aid to public schools as part of a $2 billion budget reduction package to be released tomorrow. Here's a chart that provides some perspective on the budgetary debate ahead: [caption id="at Read More

The Wall Street Journal has run my op-ed on the risks New York City faces in its approach to fiscal and economic problems. The thesis is that the city's main economic engine -- Wall Street and the financial-services industry -- cold be at th Read More

Yesterday, another New York art auction went , with a Christie's sale bringing in $146.7 million against a "low" estimate of $240.7 million. "Of the 82 works for sale, 36, or more than 40 percent, of the auction went unsold," the Times repo Read More

In the of today's , a Canadian takes aim at New York City's sky-high corporate tax burden: The effective combined U.S. federal, New York State and New York City tax rate of roughly 46% to 47% that corporations pay on their New York City Read More

IBM chief Sam Palmisano gave a to the Council on Foreign Relations today in which he proposed a private-public "smart systems"-led recovery for the economy. Read More

Governor Paterson's projects that New York State will lose more than 160,000 jobs during "the current downturn."   But if history is any guide, that could turn out to be very optimistic.   As illustrated below, the state lost 500,000 private sec Read More

Today, Mayor Bloomberg held his mid-year budget update at City Hall. Here is the big picture: The mayor is still planning for a severe but temporary downturn in revenues. But there's a very real risk -- one that went unmentioned by the mayor Read More

Late yesterday, Mayor Bloomberg announced a two-year labor agreement with District Council 37, New York City’s largest public-sector union. The agreement is a missed opportunity for the city, which stands on the brink of what could be an unpreceden Read More

The analysts at Municipal Market Advisors think that should Sen. Barack Obama win tonight, President Obama's planned income-tax hike on individual households earning over $250k could push up demand for tax-exempt municipal bonds. Read More

Addressing the possibility of mid-year cuts in school aid, which Senate leaders are pledging to avoid, Governor Paterson is quoted in today's Newsday as saying: "Seventy-one percent of the resources we spend on education are administrative. We can make a lot of cuts ... without touching the classroom or affecting teachers." Read More

Swiss bank UBS has attracted $1.5 billion to its new global infrastructure fund. "John Fraser, chairman and chief executive office of the UBS AG's funds arm, said ... he was encouraged by the demand from long-term institutional investors, including p Read More

Hardly anyone seems to believe that recent events in the global economy and financial markets will lead to long-term price stability.*  So assuming a recession is upon us, what’s next: or ? S Read More