If you are a taxpayer in the Northeast, here is some advice: Get down on a knee, clasp your hands and pray. Pray for banker bonuses this year. Big ones. Cash, preferably. New York's state government, and its dysfunctional neighbors in New Jerse Read More
The director of the Empire Center of New York State Policy warned Hudson Valley business people that 1.5 million New Yorkers have fled the state in the last decade. That means less personal income tax revenue to contribute to the state budget, said E Read More
If Gov. David Paterson and state legislators continue to do nothing about the way they spend money, the state’s general bank account will be $1 billion short at the end of December, according to state Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli, the man who writes Read More
The out-migration of New Yorkers that has been ongoing since the 1990s, according to the leaders of businesses-development and anti-tax groups, is taking its toll on the state's economy and its communities. They were responding to a recent report Read More
The often opaque world of school finances has become more transparent with a new tool that allows New Yorkers to analyze how their school districts spend money and to compare them to nearly 700 other districts around the state. Benchmarking New Yo Read More
I feel special affection for people who make my job easier, and no one meets that standard more satisfactorily than the good people at the Empire Center for Public Policy, who have just added to their already formidable Web site an entire truckload o Read More
Taxpayers have a new online resource to find out how much money school districts in New York state are spending. On Monday, the Empire Center for Public Policy added to its Web site, www.SeeThroughNY.net, a searchable database of school district s Read More
This chart shows total per-pupil spending for public school districts in Oneida County for 2007-08, listed in the order of their rankings in the 51-district Mohawk Valley region that includes Fulton, Hamilton, Herkimer, Montgomery, Oneida and Schohar Read More