A report from the Empire Center for NYS Policy released Monday made the argument for ending the estate tax, a proposal that Cuomo supports, saying that it forces people – especially the elderly – to the flee the state. The report found middle-income New Yorkers are impacted by the tax. Read More
In a new report, a coalition of groups opposing New York's estate tax offered a full-throated argument in favor of Governor Andrew Cuomo's plan to lower its rate and raise its exemption threshold from $1 million to the federal level of over $5.34 million over five years. Read More
Derided as a windfall for the wealthy, a proposal to raise New York's estate tax threshold above $1 million would actually help thousands of homeowners, farmers and small business owners, supporters argued Monday. Read More
Pro-business groups say Gov. Andrew Cuomo's proposed budget would help reduce the high tax bill that can be incurred by dying in New York. Read More
As noted by the Empire Center for Public Policy, the median salary for teachers in Western New York was $62,697, compared with $72,990 statewide. Read More
The Empire Center has updated the state government payroll section on SeeThroughNY.net, its government transparency website, to include payroll for 2013, the fiscally conservative group announced today. The database on SeeThroughNY.net includes the names, titles, base salary rates and total pay of more than 287,000 state workers in the executive, legislative or judicial branches at any time during the 2013 calendar year. Read More
With spring training around the corner, let’s compare village dissolution to baseball.Since 1921, 47 village governments have dissolved, but there has been a rise in the number that have tried in recent years—with limited success, a report today found. Read More
E.J. McMahon, head of the Empire Center for Public Policy, a nonprofit Albany think tank that promotes free market principles, questioned whether municipalities will go through the political headaches of consolidating districts in exchange for a short-term, temporary tax freeze. Read More