New York emerged as the second-costliest state for employer-sponsored health insurance after its premiums rose at more than three times the national rate in 2015. Read More
Research
The best news to come out of the final days of the 2016 legislative session may have concerned what didn’t pass. Read More
START-UP NY, New York’s signature economic development program, made headlines for creating just 408 jobs in its first two years of operations. However, bigger disappointments may lie ahead. Read More
Yesterday marked the end of a second straight sub-par fiscal year for most of the nation's state and local public pension funds, including all five New York City funds and the New York State Teachers' Retirement System (NYSTRS). Read More
Why a single-payer health plan would be wrong for New York Read More
Proponents of a single-payer health plan for New York pitch it as a cure-all — one fix that would achieve universal coverage, let people to go to any doctor or hospital, abolish copays and deductibles, cut down on paperwork, and save billions in the bargain. Forty-five billion dollars, to be precise — or so said Assembly Health Chairman Richard Gottfried of Manhattan, as the Democrat-controlled lower house passed his New York Health Act on June 1. It sounds too good to be true because it is. My analysis for the Empire Center shows that his $45 billion savings estimate relies on tendentious assumptions, debatable methods and a heavy dose of wishful thinking. Read More
The decision by the nation’s largest solar panel provider to locate a state-of-the-art manufacturing plant in Buffalo, and to create other jobs in Western New York, could be a needed shot in the arm for a city and a region that’s been declining economically for many years. But there are significant risks and unanswered questions associated with the state government’s willingness to commit the bulk of its “Buffalo Billion” resources to the massive SolarCity factory on the site of the former RiverBend steel plant. Read More
During the first few years after Wall Street prices bottomed out in 2009, public-pension funds across the country reaped double-digit returns. They were riding a bull market pumped up by ultra-low interest rates, and it wouldn’t last. Now pension managers have been struggling to break even — the predictable outcome of a funding strategy that continues to expose taxpayers to unreasonable long-term risks. Read More
Some of New York State’s major transportation infrastructure projects are now benefiting from expanded use of the design-build process—but a costly pro-union rider has been attached to proposed legislation extending design-build authorization to public works financed by New York City, and could set a troubling precedent. Read More
New York's Legislature couldn't leave town without making it easier for the music and gaming industries to collect up to $50 million a year in tax subsidies, modeled after the state's existing (and outrageous) giveaway to film and TV producers. Read More
In their latest response to the epidemic of opioid abuse, state lawmakers are indulging a habit-forming practice of their own: imposing mandates on health insurance. Read More
Private sector employment in New York State grew at barely half the U.S. average rate during the 12 months ending in May, according to the latest monthly jobs report from the state Labor Department. Read More