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

Taxpayers Lose in Pension Gamble

During New York's Tier 6 pension-reform fight earlier this year, public employee unions claimed Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo wanted to "let Wall Street gamble" with pension money. Last week brought a reminder of who's really rolling the dice. State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli announced that the pool of investments backing the New York State and Local Retirement System (NYSLRS), of which he is sole trustee, earned 5.96 percent during the fiscal year ended March 31. Read More

Wisconsin Vote Empowers Cuomo

New York politicians should heed the message of this week's Wisconsin recall election: You can defy the public-sector labor machine and live to tell the tale. Read More

Higher Minimum Wages Bad for Jobs

  • by E.J. McMahon
  • Newsday
  • June 14, 2012
  • Commentary

Despite a big push from Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver (D-Manhattan) and at least tacit support from Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, the conventional wisdom in Albany is that a proposed increase in New York's minimum wage won't go anywhere before the legislature adjourns next week. Read More

Union Deal Will Add to Tappan Zee Bridge Cost

  • by E.J. McMahon
  • Newsday
  • June 21, 2012
  • Commentary

Sometime this summer, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo will perform the financial equivalent of pulling a rabbit out of his hat -- explaining how a cash-poor, heavily indebted state government (and its Thruway Authority, whose credit rating outlook was just downgraded to "negative") will come up with $5 billion to $6 billion to build a new bridge across the widest stretch of the lower Hudson River. Read More

What the Obamacare Ruling Means for New York

  • by E.J. McMahon
  • New York Daily News
  • June 28, 2012
  • Commentary

Earlier today, the Supreme Court, after signaling numerous concerns with ObamaCare during oral arguments, reversed course and upheld the law basically in its entirety by a vote of 5-4, with Chief Justice John Roberts providing the swing vote. Read More

Here Come New School-funding Suits

  • by E.J. McMahon
  • Newsday
  • June 28, 2012
  • Commentary

Seventeen years ago, the state Court of Appeals ruled that New York State has a constitutional obligation to ensure that public schools provide all students with a "sound basic education." Read More

Why Teacher Pension Costs Will Keep Rising

The closing bell on Wall Street last Friday also marked the end of the fiscal year for many public pension funds across the country, including the New York State Teachers' Retirement System (NYSTRS), which finances pensions promised to 420,000 active and retired professional educators working mainly for school districts outside New York City. Read More