A money-saving maneuver in the newly enacted Medicaid budget could end up increasing costs in the long term – by paving the way for more unionization of the state's burgeoning home health workforce. Read More
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Filling in more details of New York's ongoing demographic decline, the Census Bureau has just released updated local population estimates showing that 80 percent of the state's towns and cities have lost residents since 2020. In addition to New Yo Read More
School districts presenting budgets to voters next Tuesday plan to spend an average of $33,404 per student, up 4.4 percent from the current school year, according to new state data. Read More
After rising sharply with an extra push from the inflation surge of 2022, sales tax receipts in New York grew much more slowly during the first four months of this year, according to from state Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli's office. Statewide sale Read More
In this episode of "Messages of Necessity", Kyle Davis, Director of Public Affairs at the Empire Center, and Cam MacDonald, Adjunct Fellow, delve into recent developments. They begin by dissecting the latest ruling on Proposition 1 and how the rule o Read More
The rule of law scored a victory yesterday when a proposition to amend the equal rights provision of the state Constitution got knocked off this fall’s general election ballot. Read More
The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA)’s payroll jumped $663 million, or 9 percent, last year as overtime spending ticked up to a new record and subsidiaries dished out $261 million in retroactive pay, according to data posted today on SeeThroughNY, the Empire Center’s government transparency website. Read More
The cancellation of planned offshore wind projects has sparked considerable heartburn and hand-wringing among lawmakers, activists and politically wired businesses and unions, but it’s been good news for the upstate families and businesses who would be paying more than half the cost. For them, each year of delays on scotched projects amounts to future electric-bill savings of upwards of $1 billion—and gives Albany another chance to find a better, less expensive way to go green. Read More