There are a whole lot of ways to close a $4.9 billion gap in a $40 billion budget, as Mayor Bloomberg demonstrated once again this week. He wants to balance the budget without imposing economically devastating tax hikes. Read More
Tag: New York City
Facing an uphill battle in Albany to win renewal of New York City's former commuter tax, the Bloomberg administration is floating a new "tax reform" idea that can only be described as breathtakingly wrongheaded. Read More
Mayor Bloomberg's $1 billion "doomsday" budget- cutting plan is widely perceived as a scare tactic designed to force concessions out of Gov. Pataki and the Legislature: Once Bloomberg gets what he needs out of Albany, the contingency plan goes back into a locked drawer in the basement of City Hall. Read More
Mayor Bloomberg's "draconian" service-cutting contingency plan dominated the headlines when he unveiled his fiscal 2004 city budget proposal last week. But the real news is that the budget has brought the city a big step closer to another massive tax hike, posing a grave new threat to New York's still-shrinking economy. Read More
After a winter and spring filled with budgetary "doomsday" talk in City Hall, New York's latest fiscal crisis has been interrupted by an eerie, eye-of-the-storm calm. In the space of two months, Mayor Bloomberg's demands for union concessions and program cuts gave way to unilateral budget restorations and celebratory photo ops with City Council leaders. Read More
Michael Bloomberg's first year as mayor of New York City produced decidedly mixed results, measured against the long-term statistical trends. Read More
Under cover of the summer doldrums, Mayor Bloomberg's budget staff is feverishly putting the finishing touches on one of the biggest bonding boondoggles in New York State's history. Read More
Despite the rebound on Wall Street, New York City's fiscal problems are far from over. Even after two years of belt-tightening, city spending continues to grow at twice the rate of inflation. With unions stonewalling requests for contract concessions a city budget gap of $2 billion to $3 billion looms in the year ahead. In short, recent talk in City Hall of rolling back tax hikes was just that--talk. Read More