E.J. McMahon

Founding Senior Fellow

Edmund J. McMahon was the Empire Center’s founding senior fellow.

McMahon’s writing and research has focused on improving New York’s economic competitiveness and promoting greater transparency, accountability and fiscal responsibility in state and local government. He has authored or co-authored major studies on public pension reform, collective bargaining, population migration, budget trends and tax policy in New York. His influential “Blueprint for a Better Budget,” published in January 2010, featured a number of recommendations subsequently implemented under Governors David Paterson and Andrew Cuomo. McMahon also was a leading advocate of an across-the-board cap on property taxes in New York before it was enacted at Governor Cuomo’s initiative in 2011.

McMahon has published numerous articles and essays in publications including the Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Barron’s, the Public Interest, the New York Post, the New York Daily News, Newsday and the Manhattan Institute’s City Journal. His frequent radio and TV interviews have included appearances on CNBC, Fox News Channel and Bloomberg News, as well as on regional cable and broadcast outlets throughout New York State.

McMahon’s professional background includes nearly 30 years as an Albany-based analyst and close observer of New York State government. As chief fiscal advisor to the Assembly Republican Conference in the early 1990s, he drafted a personal income tax reform plan that would become the basis for historic tax cuts enacted under Governor George E. Pataki. Previously, as research director of the Public Policy Institute, he worked on the Institute’s counter-budget proposals and developed the template for New York’s school report cards. He also served as a deputy commissioner in the state Department of Taxation and Finance and as a vice chancellor of the State University of New York.

McMahon is an adjunct fellow at the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research, which he joined in June 2000. In January 2005, he opened the Institute’s Albany-based Empire Center project, which became an independent nonprofit think tank in 2013. He was the Empire Center’s founding president and became research director in the fall of 2016.

Earlier in his career, he was a staff writer and columnist for the Albany Times Union and The Knickerbocker News.

McMahon is a graduate of Villanova University.

Latest Work

The Case for a Cap

  • by E.J. McMahon
  • March 1, 2011
  • Reports

A broad, tight cap on local property taxes is a central element of Governor Andrew Cuomo’s agenda for making New York State more affordable and competitive. The governor’s tax cap has passed in the state Senate with strong bipartisan support. Its fate will ultimately be decided in the state Assembly. Read More

Blame It On The Pols

  • by E.J. McMahon
  • New York Post
  • April 10, 2011
  • Commentary

The stock-market crash of 2000-02 lit the fuse on a decade long explosion in taxpayer-funded contributions to New York City’s municipal-pension systems. But a new report from Comptroller John Liu shows that roughly half the damage was avoidable -- resulting from the city’s own bad policy choices and mismanagement. Read More

Poison Pills for the Gov’s Tax-Cap

  • by E.J. McMahon
  • New York Post
  • May 13, 2011
  • Commentary

While Gov. Cuomo stumped the state this week in support of (among other things) his proposed cap on local property taxes, Speaker Sheldon Silver said the Assembly would soon introduce its own version of a tax-cap bill -- one with “not too many” exceptions. Read More

A Poison Pill for the Tax Cap?

  • by E.J. McMahon
  • New York Post
  • May 26, 2011
  • Commentary

One day after seeming to agree to an acceptable compromise on Gov. Cuomo’s proposed 2 percent cap on property-tax levies, Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver yesterday seemed to be sticking a poison pill in the fine print. Read More