Tag: Taxes and Spending

The Empire Center, an Albany think tank, released a report in May 2018 that took note of New York surpassing all other states with per-pupil elementary and secondary school spending of $22,366 per pupil as of 2016. The report noted that the Empire State spent 90 percent more than the U.S. average of $11,762, up from 86 percent above average in 2015. The education spending gap between New York and the national average has grown dramatically over the past 20 years, the Empire Center noted. Read More

Industry lawsuits filed against Governor Cuomo's $100 million opioid tax, summarized in today's Wall Street Journal, are raising fresh questions about the levy's fairness and unintended side effects. Read More

The Empire Center today released its annual “Benchmarking New York” report, comparing and ranking government tax, spending and debt levels for hundreds of counties, towns, cities and villages throughout New York. Read More

Compare the taxes, spending and debt of local governments across New York State. Read More

New York State's so-called millionaire tax, temporarily raising the state's top income tax rate to 8.82 percent from the permanent law limit of 6.85 percent, is next scheduled to expire at the end of 2019. The added tax generates roughly $4.5 billion a year, about 9 percent of net personal income tax revenues, making New York more dependent than ever on the highest-earning one percent of its taxpayers. The future of the tax has now emerged as an issue in the gubernatorial campaign. Read More

Once upon a time, anyone who wanted to know what local government employees were paid had to pick the right meeting to go to and hope the board didn’t go into executive session, or file a Freedom of Information Act request and wait. Enter the Empire Center for Public Policy. Read More

As the state legislative session comes to a close, we often focus on the things the Legislature should be doing. Read More

Her tax plan is “completely unrealistic and excessive,” Mr. McMahon said, adding that it is “based on the assumption that businesses and individuals alike are simply oblivious to higher tax rates.” Read More