Research

New York's newly enacted state budget for the fiscal year that started April 1 is balanced with higher-than-anticipated tax receipts, but out-year projected budget gaps have grown significantly larger, according to quarterly financial plan update issued late Friday afternoon by Governor Cuomo's Division of the Budget (DOB). Read More

Nearly half of the 669 school districts seeking voter approval for budgets on Tuesday, May 15 are presenting spending plans that would increase property taxes as high as the 2011 property tax cap law allows, according to an analysis released today by the Empire Center for Public Policy. Read More

When Gov. Andrew Cuomo recently signed a bill making it harder for government workers to escape labor unions, he said it was just “the first step of the resistance.” Translation: It wasn’t the last favor Cuomo hopes to do for New York’s powerful public-sector unions in anticipation of the coming US Supreme Court decision in Janus v. AFSCME, which could void state laws compelling government workers to pay dues-like agency fees to unions they choose not to join. Read More

When Governor Andrew Cuomo recently signed a bill making it harder for government workers to extricate themselves from labor unions, he said it was just “the first step of the resistance.” So, what will New York’s governor and lawmakers seek to do next for their public-sector union friends? Read More

Any plan to reduce or eliminate what local governments pay into New York’s Medicaid budget would inevitably create winners and losers. The Assembly Republicans’ version, unveiled last month, is no exception. Read More

New York's government unions collectively spent more on lobbying last year than the state's biggest trial lawyers, landlord, tobacco and hospital interests combined. And topping the list, as usual, was New York’s powerful conglomerate of public education unions. Read More