This week’s US Supreme Court ruling in Janus v. AFSCME was not unexpected — and neither was the agitated, high-volume reaction from Gov. Cuomo and the public-sector union bosses who are his strongest political allies. [Read_more]
What does the Janus ruling mean for the fiscal future of the Empire State, home of the country’s most unionized public sector? It depends, as always, on our elected officials. [Read_more]
As a 19th-century Manhattan politician once observed, “no man’s life, liberty or property are safe while the Legislature is in session.” Some things never change. On balance, New Yorkers would probably be better off if this year’s legislative session ended ahead of its scheduled June 21 adjournment. [Read_more]
Molinaro’s rhetoric made it all sound obvious — and easy. In fact, New York faces real financial constraints that’ll limit options for whoever occupies the governor’s office starting next January. [Read_more]
Among New York school districts with enrollments of 4,000 or more, the list of highest property taxes per pupil is what you’d expect — topped by Great Neck, Scarsdale, Syosset and Bedford.
In fifth place is a somewhat less wealthy outlier: the Northport-East Northport district. It will raise $28,556 per pupil in property taxes next year, based on data from the state’s 2018-19 Property Tax Report Card. That’s 57 percent above the Suffolk County average. [Read_more]
The newly revealed federal probe of Crystal Run Healthcare, a large doctors group in the Hudson Valley, fits a common pattern with Albany scandals: It's not just about bad behavior but also bad policy. [Read_more]
New Yorkers who take for granted that their hospitals are top-notch — or good, or even just so-so — should think again. The data suggest otherwise. [Read_more]
When Gov. Andrew Cuomo recently signed a bill making it harder for government workers to escape labor unions, he said it was just “the first step of the resistance.”
Translation: It wasn’t the last favor Cuomo hopes to do for New York’s powerful public-sector unions in anticipation of the coming US Supreme Court decision in Janus v. AFSCME, which could void state laws compelling government workers to pay dues-like agency fees to unions they choose not to join. [Read_more]
Cuomo has further boosted the state’s already heavy reliance on taxes paid by income millionaires. This has made Albany’s revenue base more fragile and volatile — a problem aggravated by the new federal cap on state and local tax deductions, which effectively raises total tax rates for New York’s highest earners. [Read_more]
If the high court ends compulsory agency-fee collection, many of the roughly 1 million New Yorkers who are now members of a government union are likely to quickly reconsider. If the union doesn’t trap them first. [Read_more]
The U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments Monday in Janus v. AFSCME, a constitutional challenge to the dues-like union fees many state and local government workers must now pay. The outcome could shake the foundations of public-sector union power across the nation—especially in New York. [Read_more]
It turns out the state is receiving way more federal aid than it needs to pay for the program—to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars a year—thanks to an out-of-whack formula in the Affordable Care Act. [Read_more]
