| Last week I chided Will Barclay for his ad demonizing Downstate.
Now it is Downstaters who who deserve some righteous indignation. Some pre-emptive reactions to Spitzer's State of Upstate speech are very sad:
"We have been helping upstate forever," said Assemblyman Gary Pretlow, who represents Mount Vernon and part of Yonkers in Westchester County. "Nobody is saying we should stop sending money upstate, but some needs have to be taken care of downstate. Downstate is not the land of milk and honey."
How much more should the downstate area pay to support everyplace else? I don't think we can afford any more," said Richard Bivone, president of the Nassau Council of Chambers of Commerce, who added that rising property taxes on Long Island make it difficult to ask residents there to disproportionately consider the plight of the upstate economy.
The best reasons to help Upstate are moral ones- we all share this state and Downstate has an obligation to help Upstate, even notwithstanding Upstate helping out Downstate in the 1970's.
But since these people don't seem to care about the moral obligation, there is another reason for Downstate to help Upstate: self-interest
There are differing figures, but the general number I hear most often is that New York City taxpayers give $3 billion more to Albany than we receive back from the state government each year. Presumably, most of that money goes Upstate.
Additionally, New York is likely to lose 1 or 2 congressional seats after the next census' reapportionment. The lion's share of the population loss/slower-than-US-average-growth is in Upstate New York.
Put simply, it is in Downstate's own interest to reverse the economic decline of Upstate, for no other reasons than to stop the need to ship Downstate's tax dollars Upstate and to preserve the strength of New York's congressional delegation.
If there's one thing all politicians understand, it is self-interest. Since moral reasons to help Upstate are apparently beyond the comprehension of some, anti-Upstate politicians should at least support Spitzer's plan because it will help downstate also. |
