Tom Golisano's Move To Florida A Publicity Stunt

I agree, but he is doing what a lot of people would and should do (0.00 / 0)

"They were 1,200 middle class people who moved to North Carolina for better job opportunities and lower taxes."

NYS is destroying itself and it is going to get worse. What NYC (controlled by democrats, yes that is right...forget the NYS Senate of yesterday, the the Assembly has been there for a LONG time) has done is forced a tax down the throats of upstate. Many of these people have no ties to the MTA or limited ties. You want a job killer? Raise taxes. Yes, the middle class is being killed in NY. It is not merely payroll tax, income tax or property tax, but it is the cost of living here. The answer is not raising taxes on the "rich" alone. It is not having NYC control the rest of the state and treating anyone north of the Bronx like a bastard child. Both democrats and republicans want to pull out of the MTA for one main reason. They are getting abused. Certainly there is a political element, but this tax coupled with the increases in daily costs and what will ultimately happen to property taxes is what is killing business development and the middle class.

How can it be that Foley, Oppenheimer, Johnson and Stewart-Cousins could agree to tax their own constituents when many of their own local assemblymen and women as well as local legislators opposed it? What deal were they given? Foley adamantly opposed the tax before he supported it.

Look at the MTA bailout from local perspective in Orange, Dutchess and Rockland Counties:

County Legislator Tom Mansfield, D-Red Hook, called the payroll tax "a blow to our local economy and the last thing the government needs to be doing at this time."

Legislator Joel Tyner, D-Clinton, said he, too, was disappointed by the imposition of the payroll tax. "I don't think anybody likes seeing mass transit struggling ... but there's certainly a better way than the way they've found," he said.

Dutchess County Executive William Steinhaus, a Republican, blasted the payroll tax, which he said would cost county taxpayers an additional $400,000.

"The county (Rockland) Legislature acted swiftly and unexpectedly Tuesday - unanimously passing a bill that condemned the new tax and asking the state to give it the option to withdraw from the MTA."

"It's meant as a statement of anger that we really don't want to take it anymore," said Legislature Chairwoman Harriet Cornell, D-West Nyack.

"Do we want to run the railroads? Not especially," Cornell added. "On the other hand, we don't want to see our schools, nonprofits, business and governments pay this exorbitant tax."

"Dutchess County Legislature Chairman Roger Higgins said he, too, will explore withdrawal."

"Orange Legislature Chairwoman Roxanne Donnery said it's time to let the county's position be known."

"It's really time that those governing in New York right now and making this decision find out that they can't balance New York's State on people from upstate."

"The passing of the payroll tax is absolutely unacceptable," he said. "It's the talk of the town and I think representatives in Albany rally need to hear from us."

Why? Because the average "middle class" NYer is getting slammed again. Just look at NXP and the aviation company in Dutchess County - between 400-500 jobs leaving. More taxies and levies...good for NY! Keep on taxing and see the middle class disappear.

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by: 123allent @ Tue May 19, 2009 at 15:04:11 PM UTC

Please do (0.00 / 0)

Go ahead and leave already, and write annoying comments in a NC blog.  Or, are you already in Utah and just getting paid to put comments here to plant bad ideas among progressives?

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by: robinia @ Tue May 19, 2009 at 17:14:13 PM UTC

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OK Then you cut something (0.00 / 0)

School funding? $21.9 Billion.
Medicine to old people? $49.2 Billion.
Medicine to poor people? $4.7 Billion.
Disability Assistance? $5.1 Billion.
Funding for Poor Children to eat and such? $3.3 Billion.
Roads and Bridges? $7 Billion.
Local Governments Assistance for all those state mandates? $93.2 Billion.
The Operating Budget (Jails, SUNY, Police, Executive and Judicial)? $19.2 Billion
Employee Benefits? $5.7 Billion
Debt Service? $4.5 Billion
Capital Expenditures? $6.8 Billion

That's everything. You clearly want to make wholesale cuts, so go ahead, hack away, tell me which people deserve to suffer, which students deserve to be dumb, and which bridges deserve to collapse.

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by: Amherst Guy @ Tue May 19, 2009 at 20:04:44 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

PS I misread the budget (0.00 / 0)

That $93.2 Billion in aid to local governments is actually covered in all of the other totals.  

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by: Amherst Guy @ Tue May 19, 2009 at 20:09:07 PM UTC

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I am certain... (0.00 / 0)

there are items that could be cut or work that could be dome more efficiently. For example, we could consolidate similar services where there are multiple jurisdictions providing what could be done by one. There are probably numerous mandates that could be removed. I read that nearly three quarters of a school budget goes to teachers' salaries and pensions. We should take a look at that (even if it is 65 or 60 percent) if politicians were not beholden to that particular union (see note cards for NYC council). It is not as simple as throwing out these numbers and saying "cut it." The bottom line is despite Robinia's moronic angry comment, people are leaving NY because they can't afford to live here. The companies in Dutchess I mentioned are leaving because of the cost to do business here. You can't continue to tax. Individuals may or may not leave, but when businesses leave they become unemployed. As far as who deserves to suffer we all do in some way. But by making NY one of the most expensive places to live you are draining local talent and not replenishing it.

Robinia - I am sure you consider yourself some enlightened open minded person, but your remark shows you, at least in that comment, are a small minded person. I assume it was merely that response and not in general. Nobody pays me as I assume nobody pays you. If you don't like my dissenting view don't read it and run full steam ahead with your eyes closed and we will chat again in five years. The bottom line is I, like many other metro-NYs, am getting hammered with property taxes, keeping my business afloat, paying my mortgage, paying my groceries, paying to commute, paying my school loans, paying my car insurance, paying my gas, paying my car loan (so I can get to the train station), paying for my parking pass, etc. It is no coincidence that dems and reps have come together on the issue of the MTA tax. Enough is enough, but telling someone to leave or accuse them of being a paid conspirator because the disagree is juvenile at best.

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by: 123allent @ Tue May 19, 2009 at 21:11:08 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Sorry (0.00 / 0)

I'm not a moron; people do get paid to post on blogs in such a way as to stir up certain opinions.  Like, that there must be waste that can be eliminated, or that teachers must be overpaid.

If you are a citizen and want to improve your state, then, Amherst Guy's approach is the right one.  Go to the NYS Senate website, and help work to find what your think will help.  You will find there my very concrete proposal that we should better target agriculture property tax assessment exemptions, to close a loophole that many wealthy landowners use to shift their rightful portion of property taxes onto people like you.

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by: robinia @ Wed May 20, 2009 at 14:38:47 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Look (0.00 / 0)

there are items that could be cut or work that could be dome more efficiently

Probably true. Probably worth about 1-2% of the budget at the most though. Almost all of the states money goes to paying for things. If you found a way to automate everything and you fired every worker in the state, I think you would find a savings of 5-15% tops, and that's before paying for the machines. The budget isn't so big because of Unions and Employees. It's so big because of what you Republicans call "Entitlements".

Do you really think that Pataki didn't look for inefficiencies so he could have some tax cuts to brag about?

Do you really think that Paterson's staff didn't spend every waking hour over the last 6 months trying to find things that they could cut so that they wouldn't have to raise taxes and doom Paterson's future?

He cut funding for starving children! You really think that he didn't look to "trim the fat" first?

There are inherent inefficiencies in the NYS Government, but they way to solve them isn't to elect Republicans. It's to get a new state constitution, one that eliminates authorities, the unnecessary second legislature, and merges duplicative services, like the Thruway Authority and the DOT. None of those things can be done without a constitutional amendment. THAT will save us some money.

And may I remind you that it is the Senate REPUBLICANS that NYSUT has been donating maximum amounts to for the last 50 years.

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by: Amherst Guy @ Wed May 20, 2009 at 14:55:35 PM UTC

[ Parent ]