Ken Girardin

Director of Research

Ken Girardin is the Director of Research at the Empire Center, where his work focuses on organized labor’s effect and influence on state and local government policy.

Ken worked with E.J. McMahon to produce the first independent analysis of New York’s property tax cap, which demonstrated the cap’s effectiveness and boosted efforts to extend the cap and ultimately make it permanent. He also authored The Janus Stakes, a quantitative analysis of the influence New York’s public-sector unions have over public policy in the Empire State.

Ken has a bachelor’s degree and a master’s degree in materials engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) in Troy, New York. He previously worked in the New York State Legislature.

Latest Work

Most school board members in New York's largest school districts were elected with teachers' union support and many are themselves teachers' union members. Read More

School districts have used more than 400 special meetings—votes held outside the regular May and November election days—since 2011 to approve nearly $9 billion in spending, including about $2 billion last year.  Read More

Governor Kathy Hochul this week made around one of the state’s messiest bureaucracies when she took steps to allow bars to serve fans on Sunday morning as they watch their Bills play five time zones ahead in London. But Read More

Plans to lure a Canadian battery company to the Hudson Valley with a slew of government incentives, including job-creation tax credits, loans, and federal subsidies, appear to be a dud. It’s a reminder that when it comes to picking winners in the energy-storage space, taxpayers are often losers. Read More

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