Testimony

Governor Cuomo’s Executive Budget for fiscal year 2020 includes a short list of state revenue actions. By far the most significant tax proposal on the list would extend, for five years, the temporary added personal income tax (PIT) rate also known as the “millionaire tax.” Read More

Testimony of Bill Hammond, Health Policy Director, Empire Center for Public Policy, Before the Joint Legislative Fiscal Committees Read More

The past year has been a roller-coaster ride for New York’s health care system, as Congress tried repeatedly to scale back Medicaid and dismantle the Affordable Care Act while allowing other health-related programs to lapse. Because New York depends so heavily on federal health dollars, it had more to lose than almost any other state in all of those fights. Read More

Making the tax cap permanent and forging ahead with the personal income tax cuts are essential steps for minimizing the negatives and maximizing the positives of the new federal tax law. Read More

Lawmakers should make reforms to New York's Health Care Reform Act taxes and fees instead of renewing them virtually unchanged, Bill Hammond testified. Read More

Lawmakers should allow the state's surcharge on high incomes to expire because of its volatility as a revenue source and its impact on the state's competitiveness, E.J. McMahon, the Empire Center's research director, testified. Read More

"It’s time to more closely scrutinize the entire overblown premise of New York State’s economic development programs." Read More

Lawmakers should reject the Thruway toll gimmicks in the budget, and should repair the 'cliff' in the state's estate tax, Empire Center president E.J. McMahon testified. Read More

E.J. McMahon, president of the Empire Center, testified before the Senate Labor Committee on the impact of Gov. Andrew Cuomo's proposal to impose a $15 statewide minimum wage. Read More

Changes made last year to the Corporation Franchise Tax and Estate Tax codes will help make New York a more attractive and competitive place to live, work and do business. However, there remains much to do. Read More

Governor Cuomo’s 2014-15 Executive Budget would devote more resources to initiatives described as “tax cuts” than any state budget we’ve seen in quite a few years. This in itself is an encouraging sign of the recognition that New York needs to do more to shed its reputation as a high-cost, high-tax state. Read More

The Great Recession and its aftermath have brought obvious, ongoing strains to finances at every level of government. What we have been experiencing for the past five years is something new and unprecedented in the post-World War II era: a prolonged period of slow growth with pronounced disinflationary tendencies. Read More