Blog

Governor Andrew Cuomo floated quite a few dubious ideas in his State of the State address yesterday, a couple of which are the subject of my Newsday column today—but the most dubious proposal of all came from Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver in his own brief remarks before the governor spoke. Read More

Why is New York City comptroller John Liu trivializing government by inserting it into a petty dispute between entertainment giants? Yesterday, Liu put out a showing that he's ready to fight for New Yorkers who face a grave crisis: "nearly 2 mill Read More

Trying to rein in runaway Medicaid spending is an historic annual event in New York. Governor Cuomo's Medicaid Redesign Team was assigned the most recent task of both reducing spending and increasing the quality of care. Read More

Interrupting a relentless stream of negative stories about natural gas hydrofracking in the Northeast, The New York Times notices that gas exploration in neighboring Pennsylvania has touched off a boom in New York’s once-languishing Southern Tier. Read More

The Governor's Spending and Government Efficiency (SAGE) Commission issued an overdue presentation to the Governor on December 15, 2011.  Tucked away on , is one proposal the Governor needs to embrace with open Read More

Using public pension funds to help finance infrastructure projects like the Tappan Zee Bridge would be “a bad idea, harmful both to the state’s government employees and its taxpayers,” Professor Edward Zelinsky of Cardozo Law School writes in a provocative op-ed in today’s New York Post. Read More

New York’s state revenues are disproportionately generated in New York City and its suburbs, resulting in a net transfer of income to upstate, according to a report issued today by the Nelson A. Rockefeller Institute of Government. Read More

In a landmark case revolving around key provisions of New York’s Freedom of Information Law, the Empire Center is asking the state’s highest court to review lower-court rulings that would enable the New York City Police Pension Fund — and, potentially, the state’s other public pension systems, as well — to keep secret the names of retired employees receiving taxpayer-guaranteed pension benefits. Read More

Here's some more evidence of how Gov. Cuomo's 29 percent personal income-tax hike for top earners is a risky proposition for New York City. In response to a request from City Councilman James Oddo, the city's Independent Budget Office (IBO) . T Read More

A new to promote employment for unemployed inner-city youth was part of this week’s tax increase deal between Governor Cuomo and the Legislature. Like the rest of Wednesday’s legislative package, the youth employment Read More

Gov. Cuomo's tax-hike package -- according to him -- is an "extraordinary benefit to the state ... that the state desperately, desperately needs to help turn around this economy." E.J.'s been covering all the reasons why and turn around "this eco Read More