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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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Post Number: 30648
Registered: 01-2000
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, September 02, 2012 - 4:57 pm: | 
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Study: State slow to get jobs
SARA FOSS / Schenectady (NY) Gazette Reporter
September 2, 2012 | Page B1
A new report paints a dismal portrait of the economic recovery, noting that unemployment has been high for years and the state's modest job growth is concentrated among low-wage industries.
Despite this, New York has actually fared better than other states, according to the Latham-based Fiscal Policy Institute's annual "State of Working" report, released today.
James Parrott, the institute's deputy director and chief economist, said that over the past four years, only five states have done better than New York in terms of net job growth: North Dakota, Texas, Arkansas, Oklahoma and Louisiana. Even so, no state had a higher increase in unemployment over the past two years than New York. Since July 2008, the state has experienced the net loss of 144,000 middle-wage jobs and 29,000 high-wage jobs, and a net gain of 194,000 jobs in low-wage industries.
 That tells you that public worker salaries ought to at least be frozen.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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Post Number: 30515
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, August 08, 2012 - 10:13 pm: |
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High taxes a good reason to abandon New York for Florida
A Schenectady (NY) Gazette Letter to the Editor
Aug. 8, 2012
In Florida, tourism pays the taxes. In Nevada, it's casinos. Montana and Alaska -- oil, gas and other natural resources. These places have lower taxes because they have lower costs and alternative revenue streams. NY needs to lower its costs and find alternative revenues, such as shale gas. Until it does both, leaving the state will be in the economic interests of more than a few.
The Aug. 2 letter [“Family to high-tax N.Y.: ‘We’re outta here!’] got me thinking about how right the person who wrote it was, as my wife and I feel the same way and also plan to leave the high-tax state of New York.
I also did a little checking just to compare the two states mentioned in the letter as far as taxes are concerned, and I thought maybe your readers would like to see what a vast difference there is between New York and Florida.
First New York does have a sales tax, which can vary from a low of 4 percent to a high of 9 percent, depending on what county you are in, whereas Florida has a tax of 6 percent — period.
Next, the gas tax: New York is 49 cents per gallon, while Florida is 16.6. Then I checked cigarette tax (I do not smoke, but feel for any smoker who lives in New York), which is only $4.35 per pack upstate but if you live in New York City you can add another $1.50 per pack to that for a total of $5.85 per pack — compared to 33.9 cents per pack in Florida!
New York’s state income tax is a low of 4 percent to a high of 8.97 percent, depending on your income; Florida has no state income tax. Property tax: Don’t even go there!
I can go on about the massive differences, but don’t want to totally ruin your day. Am I disgusted about the sad state of affairs in New York? You bet, and I am doing the same as the other writer and voting with my feet as I do not see any chance of it getting better.
So, to the rest of you who do stay and continue to pay higher and higher taxes each year, I say turn off the lights on your way out, and good luck!
Steven Roberts
Fonda
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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Post Number: 30479
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, August 03, 2012 - 8:08 pm: |
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Family to high-tax N.Y.: “We’re outta here!”
A Schenectady (NY) Gazette Letter to the Editor
Aug. 2, 2012
We are voting with our feet. New York is no longer meeting our needs, and we believe that moving to a different state will be the best thing for our family.
The first need that New York is not meeting is the need for smaller government. Compare New York’s 690-plus school districts to Florida’s 63. There are many, many fewer superintendents and their staffs to pay in Florida. This leads to the second need that New York does not meet. It is important for us to keep our taxes affordable. Less government lends itself to lower taxes. Florida has no income tax — at all. New York is the perpetual leader in the “contest” of having the highest property taxes in the country.
Compare New York’s 4.5 to 5 percent of value property/school tax to Florida’s 1 to 1.5 percent of value property/school tax. According to Education Week, Florida and New York rank among the top five public school systems in the country.
To add insult to injury with regard to our experience in New York, we recently learned that we will have to pay a nearly $1,000 sales tax just to sell our house and leave this state. This is not a capital gains tax — it is a sales tax. On top of that, we have to pay $5 for the privilege of filing the tax form associated with the tax.
More and more, we are also feeling a need to be free from the influence of unions. Florida is a right-to-work state while New York is heavily influenced by the deep pockets of public unions. This, of course, fuels the high taxes we seek to escape.
We believe that our need for autonomy will be better met elsewhere. Florida offers freedoms that New York does not offer. For instance, I can eat transfat in any county in the entire state of Florida. I can no longer purchase my favorite soft serve ice cream with chocolate dip in Albany County because of its ban on transfat. We seek to escape the “nanny state” environment and be allowed to make grown-up decisions for ourselves.
We love our community and many of the people in it. However, the government has made it unpalatable to continue to work, pay taxes and raise our children here. We bid you adieu and wish you all the best.
Chris Patricca
Niskayuna
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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Post Number: 30062
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Thursday, May 03, 2012 - 11:37 pm: |
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Illinois 3rd-worst in nation for business, CEO survey says
By Lennie Jarratt / Champion News
May 3, 2012
Once again Illinois ranks 48th state to do business. Only New York and California ranked worse.
Texas was ranked the best state for business for the eighth consecutive year, followed by Florida, North Carolina, Tennessee and Indiana. Most of the top 20 states are also right-to-work states, a key factor in their attractiveness to CEOs, according to the survey.
State and local taxes also played a role with Illinois having a tax burden of 9.97%, or .17% above the national average.
You can see the full report at the Chief Executive’s website.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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Post Number: 29910
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Thursday, April 19, 2012 - 9:39 pm: |
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States' Revenues Rise Above Peak Levels after Two Straight Years of Growth
But Rockefeller Institute report finds growth softening, local governments struggling
The Nelson A. Rockefeller Institute of Government Press Release
April 19, 2012
Albany, N.Y. — States' tax collections grew for the eighth straight quarter at the end of 2011, for the first time topping peak revenue levels seen at the beginning of the Great Recession, according to Rockefeller Institute research and Census Bureau data [pdf].
States' tax revenues grew by 3.6 percent in the fourth quarter of 2011 compared to a year ago. The gains were 3.0 percent and 7.4 percent higher than during the same quarters of 2007 and 2008, respectively. Nonetheless, tax collections in 17 states remain lower in the final quarter of 2011 than they were four years before.
With the exception of the Far West, all regions of the country saw gains in tax revenue during the fourth quarter of 2011, the report shows. The Plains region had the largest gain, at 12.5 percent, followed by the Great Lakes states at 8.9 percent. The Far West showed a decline of 3.9 percent in tax collections — led by an 8.3 percent decline in California alone.
Preliminary figures for the first two months of 2012 suggest the trend in rising revenue will continue, with 45 early reporting states showing a 4 percent gain in revenues over January and February 2011. Gains in state tax collections overall appear to be softening, however, writes report author Lucy Dadayan.
Local governments are not faring well. Local tax collections had remained strong for most of the period during and after the recession, but trends are shifting due in part to the lagged impact of falling house prices on property tax revenues, according to the report. Local property tax revenues grew by a modest 0.6 percent in the fourth quarter, but declined in inflation-adjusted terms.
"Services and functions that are largely funded by local governments, such as education and public safety, are likely to be under severe fiscal pressures for some time if current trends continue," Dadayan writes.
Region added 8,000 private-sector jobs in past year
By Eric Anderson / Albany (NY) Times Union
April 19, 2012
ALBANY — Government jobs may be on the ropes, but the private sector is thriving in the Capital Region, according to the latest report from the state Department of Labor.
The Capital Region added 8,000 private-sector jobs over the past year to March, a 2.4 percent gain that outpaced both the state's 2.1 percent rise and the nation's 2.0 percent increase, said state labor markets analyst James Ross.
Meanwhile, public sector employment fell by 400 jobs, or 0.4 percent, over the same period.
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The Capital Region now has regained 95 percent of the private-sector jobs it lost since its March peak in 2008, Ross added.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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Post Number: 29752
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, April 01, 2012 - 12:07 pm: |
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Tax breaks for everyone
An Albany (NY) Times Union Editorial
March 31, 2012
THE ISSUE:
New Yorkers are spared the tax on clothing, as long as it costs less than $110.
THE question:
Why is clothing and footwear taxed at all?
First came that deal late last year to raise state income tax rates a bit for millionaires and lower the rates a tad for the middle class. Now comes the expiration of an ill-conceived Paterson administration budget maneuver that raised the sales tax burden on modest purchases of clothes and shoes.
We could get used to a New York like this.
More tax fairness is the sort of progress that hits home for most New Yorkers — much more so than, say, the on-time passage of the state budget, which has the governor and legislative leaders doing cartwheels of self-congratulation.
A tax on such a necessity as clothing is regressive under any circumstances. But in a time of economic hurt, as the gap between the 99 percent and the 1 percent is increasingly visible, the elimination of the clothing tax break was like a sharp stick in the eye.
Though it's difficult to imagine such a tax hike being politically palatable today, it was fair game in 2010 for a state desperate for revenue. Suddenly, in a recession, were taxed at 4 cents on the dollar on purchases costing less than $110. Eighteen months later, the best we can say about that is: Thank heavens for legislation that comes with an expiration date.
And the complete sales tax exemption for purchases of less than $55 that took effect a year ago? That was a nice start, but we're glad the threshold has doubled, to its old level.
The clothing tax exemption also offers a welcome competitive boost for local brick-and-mortar retailers, who often find it hard to compete with out-of-state mail-order firms.
When might New York see the wisdom in not taxing clothing and footwear at all, or at least everything short of the true extravagance of luxury?
Massachusetts doesn't tax clothing. Nor does Vermont. Nor do 39 other states.
There are fairer and more sensible ways to pay for government. The state took in some $330 million in the six months after the exemption was lifted in October of 2010; $210 million since the $55 tax-exemption was imposed a year ago.
Relying more heavily on taxing income, rather than sales, allows states to better determine who is more able to pay taxes and what their reasonable share might be. It's also more above board.
Everyone notices how much money is in their paycheck — not only what they're paid, but also how much is withheld for state and federal income taxes.
Retail purchases, though, can have a way of obscuring how much is the actual purchase price and how much is the sales tax. When the state began taxing all clothing purchases 2010, the point was made that it was such an easy place to go looking for money.
So, watch those sales receipts, New Yorkers. Less regressive taxation is here — a little, anyway, at last.
Restore sales tax on clothes
A Schenectady (NY) Gazette Editorial
April 1, 2012
A few times a week for the past month, the Gazette has carried stories about school budget cuts so deep that dozens of teachers are losing their jobs in just about every district. So why is the state, which is providing a modest hike in education aid this year when a larger one is needed, cutting the sales tax on clothing yet again?
For the past year, the state’s 4 percent tax on clothing costing less than $55 was suspended — saving consumers a mere $2.20 on purchases of that amount but costing the state roughly $210 million. Now, with the exemption rising to $110 on April 1, the annual revenue loss is expected to more than double, to roughly $600 million. That’s a lot of teachers’ salaries.
Retailers like the clothing exemption because it helps generate sales — in theory, anyway. But it’s been monkeyed with so many times over the years — from a week twice a year to all the time, from never to all the time with a reduced threshold — who the heck can keep track?
And it’s not like it makes any kind of sense for consumers to drive to Vermont or Massachusetts, where there are no sales taxes on clothing, given the price of gas.
Nobody likes paying sales tax — on anything. And while some consumers will go to great lengths to avoid doing so on large purchases, it just doesn’t make that much difference on relatively small ones. But the nickels, dimes and quarters add up for the state, and even though it’s in better financial shape than it was when the ill-advised decision was made, the recently passed budget makes clear that it’s still not out of the woods.
Lawmakers should climb down from their grandstands and reinstate this tax.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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Post Number: 29707
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, March 25, 2012 - 5:53 pm: |
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DiNapoli Urges Caution As Budget Negotiations Continue
Collections Up, But Well Below Initial Projections
NY Comptroller Press Release
March 21, 2012
Tax collections through February were $172.1 million more than estimates from the updated state 2011-12 Financial Plan, according to the February monthly cash report released today by State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli. Year-to-date growth of 6.4 percent is slightly more than the year-end growth of 6 percent projected in mid-February, but less than expected when the budget was passed a year ago.
"While it is encouraging that tax collections are currently ahead of projections, this does not mean that there will be additional funding for the 2012-2013 state budget," DiNapoli said. "The only reason collections are up is because projections were lowered twice since last March. We should continue to be cautious about revenue assumptions for the coming year."
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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Post Number: 29493
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 22, 2012 - 7:21 pm: |
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Sales tax collections see rebound
Higher revenues signal a growing economy, but comptroller is cautious
Associated Press / Albany (NY) Times Union
February 21, 2012
ALBANY — In another sign of slow economic recovery in New York's communities, sales tax revenue last year matched or exceeded pre-recession levels of 2008 in most parts of the state, according to a report released Tuesday.
State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli said sales tax collections grew by 5 percent last year, raising that revenue in many parts of the state above 2008 levels. But DiNapoli noted that Tuesday's figures reflect continued slow recovery, which is even slower than in 2010.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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Post Number: 29376
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, February 12, 2012 - 5:21 pm: |
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The States Are Leading a Pro-Growth Rebellion
The message from Indiana and elsewhere is that aligning yourself too closely to unions is a losing strategy.
By ARTHUR B. LAFFER / WALL STREET JOURNAL with over 170 comments
Feb. 11, 2012
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The latest shock to the Democratic agenda is Indiana's adoption of a right-to-work law that bans contracts that require private-sector employees to pay union dues. And there are many more such changes on the state level to follow.
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The benefits to states having right-to-work legislation are overwhelming. As demonstrated by a number of economists, most notably Ohio State's Richard Vedder and Harvard's Robert Barro, the economies in states with right-to-work laws grow significantly faster than those in forced-union states. They also have higher employment growth, attract more residents, and have more rapid growth in state and local tax revenues than forced-union states.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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Post Number: 28848
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Thursday, December 08, 2011 - 10:41 pm: |
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Region wins $62.7M for 88 projects
Governor's "Open for Business" grants range from $14,000 for training to $11.5M for Port of Albany
By RICK KARLIN, Albany (NY) Times Union Capitol bureau
December 8, 2011
Exactly why is government involved in handing out money to businesses? Separately, for those who want a fairer corporate tax, what are you going to do about grants and community development money? Sure, you can tax all corporations the same, but you can also provide "rebates" through grants and incentives outside the tax code. It ends up being the same thing as giving tax breaks to special interests.
ALBANY — Strictly speaking, the Capital Region wasn't among the four big winners in Gov. Andrew Cuomo's "Open for Business" grant competition.
But the local panel will still get $62.7 million in public money — either direct grants or tax credits — to help jump-start 88 projects ranging from low-income housing improvements and job training to biomedical research and rail yard improvements.
The payouts range in cost from $14,000 for a training program for manufacturing to $11.5 million for improvements to the Port of Albany that will double its capacity on the eastern shore of the Hudson. Some of the other big-ticket projects approved include:
$3.8 million to expand and update Albany International Airport's largest maintenance facility.
$5.4 million to convert the former St. Joseph's School in Arbor Hill into Swan Street Lofts, with 22 residential units and community facility space.
$3.3 million for demolition at the Ida Yarbrough Homes and construction of 43 family rental units.
$2 million to support biomedical research at UAlbany's RNA Institute.
$2.2 million to build a transloading facility linking rail and truck transport in Columbia County.
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The big winners among the state's 10 regional development panels, receiving more than $100 million each, were Western New York, Central New York, the North Country and Long Island.
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Overall, the governor and his team announced $785 million in grants and tax credits for more than 700 projects across the state.
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Some of the awards across the state consisted of tax credits to manufacturers that need to purchase equipment to expand their operations, added Bruce Katz, a vice president at the Brookings Institution think tank and one of the judges for the various proposals.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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Post Number: 28594
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, October 23, 2011 - 8:53 pm: |
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Investment in education pays off in jobs
A St. Petersburg (FL) Times Editorial
October 21, 2011
The 280 high-paying jobs a New York biotech firm promised as it announced Thursday it is relocating to St. Petersburg is the exact kind of job growth Florida needs. But the full lesson of wooing IRX Therapeutics Inc. — which is developing a new drug for mouth and throat cancers — is that this success is possible because of investments Florida taxpayers have been making for decades in higher education. It is a reminder that our state's future is limited only by our ambition and willingness to financially commit to it.
With politicians lining up for credit over tech valley jobs, you never hear them say anything about jobs leaving the state. The trend is still for more jobs to leave than to come in.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, October 11, 2011 - 6:57 pm: |
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N.Y. faces 10,000 Wall St. cuts through 2012
By Greg Morcroft and Matt Andrejczak, MarketWatch
Oct. 11, 2011
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — The securities industry in New York City faces likely job cuts of nearly 10,000 through 2012 as Wall Street banks cope with lower trading revenue, new regulations restricting their activities, and bruised stock prices, according to a new report.
State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli also said in the report that industry bonuses are likely to shrink this year.
“It now seems that profits will decline sharply from last year’s level, job losses will grow, and cash bonuses will be smaller,” DiNapoli said in his yearly report that makes predictions on the state of Wall Street.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, September 27, 2011 - 10:03 pm: |
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Recession hit state in its numbers
New Census stats show New Yorkers' incomes fell, poverty rate rose
By AMANDA SAKUMA / Hearst Newspapers via the Albany (NY) Times Union
September 27, 2011
WASHINGTON -- New York was not immune to the impact of the recession as new Census Bureau statistics showed Monday that the state was hit by lower household incomes and higher poverty rates.
A report by the Joint Economic Committee of Congress showed that 14.9 percent of New York's population, roughly 2.8 million, was living below the official poverty line in 2010, a 1.3 percent increase since 2007.
The nationwide poverty rate was 15.1 percent, with federal standards defining the poverty line as a family of four living on a $22,050 yearly income.
For New York, the committee cited statistics that showed in 2010:
The median household income in the state was $54,148, compared with the national average of $50,046. New York income was down 3.7 percent from 2007.
When educators and state employees tell you NY is a high wage state, tell them, "Yeah. A HOUSEHOLD--typically 2 incomes--earns a whopping $4,000 more a year than the average US household."
Of New York children under age 18, 21.2 percent lived in poverty.
For New Yorkers over age 65, 10.9 percent were in poverty.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Thursday, September 22, 2011 - 10:50 pm: |
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Household Incomes in City Fall 5%
Nearly One in Three Children Living in Poverty, Data Show
By JOSEPH DE AVILA and SUMATHI REDDY / WALL STREET JOURNAL
Sept. 22, 2011
The financial downturn took a bite out of New York pocketbooks last year as incomes across the city fell by nearly 5%, according to Census data released Thursday.
Manhattan was the hardest hit: Median household income dropped by nearly 9% from the previous year, to $63,832, while mean income fell to $119,199 from $131,704. Only Staten Island saw an increase in median income.
No income group was immune, said Mark Mather, a demographer at Population Reference Bureau, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit research group. "There was a drop for those making $200,000 or more," he said. "That shows that there are people at the upper end who are also seeing declines."
Since public workers, including educators,have seen their salaries remain stable to slightly increasing, that means private sector workers have suffered larger than average drops. The gap between public and private sector wages for all but the rich continues to expand, with public sector workers cleaning up, even though they feel put upon.
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The data come from the U.S. Census Bureau's annual American Community Survey, which polls people nationwide. The survey differs from the Census, the official count of the population done every 10 years.
One of the most startling developments in the ACS this year, experts said, is a rise of three percentage points in the childhood poverty level, which now stands at about 30% citywide and is even higher in the Bronx and in Brooklyn. A family of four making less than $22,314 a year—before the addition of any government assistance—is considered below the poverty line.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, August 03, 2011 - 7:55 pm: |
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Empire State's Half-Century Exodus
A Population Migration Overview
By: E.J. McMahon and Robert Scardamalia / Empire Center for New York Policy
Complete report in PDF format
August 02, 2011
New York lost a net 1.6 million residents to other states between 2000 and 2010, according to 2010 Census data. The domestic migration outflow, coupled with a slowdown in foreign immigration, ensured that New York’s share of the nation’s population continued to slide in the first decade of the 21st century.
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The increase of 2 million people in the state’s total population since 1980, despite the continuing net outflow of residents to the rest of the country, can be attributed mainly to the “natural increase” of births over deaths. But since New York’s population has risen much more slowly than the national average, it has lost 10 congressional seats since 1980, and will lose two more based on 2010 census results.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, July 23, 2011 - 10:23 am: |
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The Empire State Can Rise Again
Upstate cities like Buffalo and Rochester were once powerhouses. They can be again, if politicians encourage local entrepreneurship
By JONATHAN COHEN AND JOHN GIARDINO / WALL STREET JOURNAL with over 20 comments
July 23, 2011
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Today New York's once-vibrant upstate region is no more. People are moving away in droves. Industries like Bethlehem Steel in Buffalo and Kodak in Rochester are dead or dying. Cultural institutions struggle for funds and relevance. The University of Buffalo, once regarded as the crown jewel of the SUNY system, barely ranks on a national level. Buffalo's population, 580,000 in 1950, is now dwindling toward 260,000, and the city is now the third poorest in the nation on a per-capita basis.
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For years, elected officials have promised exciting projects to turn things around. A high-speed train is the fantasy of the moment. From time to time, convention centers and other forms of temporary employment do materialize. But these projects create very little sustainable income. In fact, they often have a negative effect. In the 1980s, the late Congressman Jack Kemp led an effort to replace Buffalo's perfectly well-functioning transit corridor, Main Street, with a subsidized subway line and a downtown pedestrian mall. Ridership never achieved projected levels for the subway. The system has never paid for itself and, by banning cars, the pedestrian mall killed downtown's commercial district.
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If there is one lesson to be learned from New York State's history, it's that people and ideas must precede bricks and mortar. The empire-building spirit can be restored if local officials get real about smaller populations and smaller budgets, and pursue policies that encourage local entrepreneurship—not dependence on Albany and Washington.
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Mr. Cohen, a former aide to Mayor Ed Koch, and Mr. Giardino, a member of Buffalo's Financial Control Board, are the co-founders of the New York Policy Forum.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, April 29, 2011 - 11:30 pm: |
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Upstate taxes tops in national study
By RICK KARLIN / Albany (NY) Times Union Capitol bureau
April 29, 2011
ALBANY -- New York's highest-in-the-nation property tax burden is an ongoing story.
But now the focus is shifting upstate in light of data showing that the nation's 15 highest taxed counties are all north of the New York City suburbs or in the western part in the state, when calculated by taxes as a percentage of home values.
According to the Tax Foundation, a non-partisan Washington D.C.-based research group, Orleans County ranks first in the nation for property taxes, with a $2,610 annual tax bill on a median-priced $87,200 home.
Just behind Orleans are Niagara, Monroe and Allegany counties.
Closer to the Capitol Region, Montgomery County ranks 11th of 1,824 counties surveyed nationally, with a median tax burden of $2,408 for a $96,900 home.
Schenectady County comes in 24th highest with taxes running $3,641 on a median-priced $163,000 home.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, March 09, 2011 - 7:00 pm: |
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Region loses thousands of jobs
By Chris Churchill / Albany (NY) Times Union Business Writer
March 9, 2011
ALBANY -- The Capital Region's unemployment rate in January was 8.2 percent, the state Department of Labor reported Wednesday.
That's nearly the same as the rate of 8.3 percent reported for the same month a year ago -- showing that joblessness remains a stubborn problem, despite what has been described as a generally improving economy.
In fact, the number of employed people in the region declined significantly during the course of the year, from 411,600 a year ago to 403,100 in January.
That means the unemployment rate would be significantly higher if not for the fact that thousands of workers have left the job market. (The unemployment rate only includes workers who are jobless and actively looking for work.)
The number of jobs in the region fell 6.4 percent over the course of the year, the department of labor reported.
Most of those lost positions are in the public sector, including state government.
The number of jobs at private, non-government companies is up slightly, rising 0.3 percent over the year.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, February 19, 2011 - 2:35 pm: |
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E-file to shut tax center
1,500 to be jobless after state contractor decides to close processing site
By RICK KARLIN / Albany (NY) Times Union Capitol Bureau
February 19, 2011
ALBANY -- The nearly 900 state employees laid off at the end of 2010 represented the biggest single hit to the state work force in more than a decade. Now comes word that another 1,500 people will be out of work after next year.
No, Gov. Andrew Cuomo hasn't announced another round of state layoffs -- at least not yet. But Bank of America this week said it would shutter its tax center near Kingston, where a combination of year-round and seasonal workers have processed New Yorkers' tax returns since the mid-1990s.
The growth of electronic filing has made the jobs obsolete, bank officials said.
In shutting down the center, Bank of America is closing the book on what had been a long and bitter debate over where state-contracted jobs should be located.
But ultimately, it wasn't politics or lobbying but technology that led to the change.
Despite what you've heard about housing, international outsourcing and bank derivatives causing the recession, the root cause of it was simply technology replacing human workers. Bernanke's quantitative easing will have almost no impact on the unemployment rate. We only need 85% of the total workforce to produce everything we can possibly need and reasonably want. What are we going to do when we only need 75% of the workforce to do the same thing?
Here's the truth: If you want full employment--which is a good idea--the wages and benefits of all workers earning more than the bottom 20% MUST GO DOWN.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 26923
Registered: 01-2000
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, February 07, 2011 - 10:34 pm: |
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Once-stable government jobs not safe: 34,700 lost in past year
By Cara Matthews / Binghamton (NY) Press Connects
February 5, 2011
ALBANY -- Government jobs have long been a stable and secure career for hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers.
But between December 2009 and December 2010, the federal, state and local governments shed 34,700 jobs -- more than any other sector in New York.
The local government sector, which includes school districts, was hit the hardest with a loss of 24,800 positions, or 2.3 percent, according to state Labor Department statistics.
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New York State United Teachers union estimates that the state lost 10,000 education jobs in the past year, spokesman Carl Korn said. State education funding has dropped by $1.86 billion since 2008-09, when it was $21.4 billion, he said.
Likely inflated by twice the actual number.
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The manufacturing sector was the hardest hit, losing 294,500 jobs, or 39 percent, between 2000 and 2010. That's almost twice the percentage lost in the information sector, which includes publishing, telecommunications and other industries. And it's nearly four times the decline in financial activities, such as insurance and real estate.
The Southern Tier shed 17,000 manufacturing jobs, or 32 percent, during the past decade. Even harder hit were the Rochester Metro area, which was down 43,700 jobs, or 42.4 percent, and western New York, which lost 42,400, or 40.2 percent.
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Certain sectors have experienced healthy growth, particularly tourism, health-care and private educational-services industries, the report said.
The state added 69,800 jobs at private colleges, universities and professional schools from 2000 to 2010, a 38 percent increase. Educational and health services grew in all parts of the state -- 13.7 percent in the Southern Tier, 24.5 percent in the Rochester region, 16.9 percent in the Hudson Valley and 8.4 percent in western New York.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 26860
Registered: 01-2000
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Thursday, January 27, 2011 - 11:45 pm: |
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State Wrests Control of Nassau
By SUMATHI REDDY / WALL STREET JOURNAL
JANUARY 27, 2011
UNIONDALE—A state oversight board took control of Nassau County's beleaguered finances Wednesday, a move that will likely be legally challenged.
The six-member board voted unanimously to impose a control period on one of the nation's wealthiest and highly taxed counties.
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NIFA has the authority to assume control if the county has a deficit of 1% or there is a likelihood of it. On Wednesday NIFA Chairman Ronald Stack pegged the county's 2011 budget gap at $176 million; county officials have insisted the budget is balanced.
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Nassau joins a small group of municipalities in New York that have been under state control. Buffalo is currently the only other community under "hard control," according to the state comptroller's office.
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NIFA board members gave county officials until Feb. 15 to submit a revised budget and financial plan that is balanced.
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 26834
Registered: 01-2000
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Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, January 22, 2011 - 11:33 am: |
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Inflation does exist; where's the outrage?
An Albany (NY) Times Union Letter to the Editor
January 22, 2011
The government defines inflation to suit its purposes. Right now, it does not suit its purpose to have rising energy and food costs to be acknowledged as significant indicators of inflation. That's because it wants to keep printing money to re-inflate stock prices. If it had to acknowledge inflation, it couldn't keep doing that, so it doesn't acknowledge it.
I am a senior citizen living on a fixed income. The powers that be say we do not have inflation. The costs of the things that I use seem to be out of control. This probably is true for everyone.
I pay much more for gasoline. I pay much more for food. I pay much more for water. And it seems that I am paying much more for heating my home.
These are the items that all of us use daily. They are necessities. I am tired of hearing that inflation is nonexistent when these costs keep going up.
The problem is, what is being done about it? The last time gasoline reached $3 a gallon, there was outrage. Have we become so brainwashed that we will accept that nothing is being done to help us?
Alan Kardon
Clifton Park
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Jerry Moore (Admin)
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 26745
Registered: 01-2000
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, January 09, 2011 - 3:34 pm: |
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A recovery? That's when government creates jobs
By Alex Wynnyczuk / Albany (NY) Times Union
January 9, 2011
This article should make it clear that some people believe the private sector exists to fight over the bones tossed to it by favored public employees.
When the National Bureau of Economic Research announced that the recession that started in December 2007 had ended in June 2009, many people could not believe it.
This is because most people think of a recession as the period of bad economic times, while economists define it as period of declining economic activity. By this definition, when the economy stops declining, the recession ends. That happened in the summer of 2009.
Since that time, "general economic activity" has been growing. However, the expansion of the economy has been relatively slow and very uneven, probably more so than during the most previous business cycles.
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To speed up job creation and economic growth, some argue for an additional stimulus. The question is, of course, what kind of stimulus would help to put the economy on a more even keel?
Pumping more money into the economy, as the Federal Reserve is still doing, probably will only increase wellbeing of the financial sector and have a negligible effect on employment. Various tax cuts, especially for low-income people, could give some impetus to spending on consumer goods, but it would also stimulate imports from low-wage countries. Another stimulus to businesses to spend money on investment would probably lead to more ways to increase labor productivity and output without hiring more people.
One way to help the employment situation would be to approach the labor market directly. The federal government could send money to state and local governments to rehire all the police officers, firefighters, teachers and other employees who were laid off recently. It could also finance the employment and/or retraining of other people who have been receiving unemployment benefits for long time, in order to help to reintegrate them back into the labor market. Simply put, only some form of direct employment by the government could break the stagnation in the labor market.
You don't create riches for public employees at the expense of others. That's what Greece did. It doesn't work. Moreover, it's unfair. If you want to create jobs, you don't create jobs that produce nothing. You create jobs that fix bridges and highways, that upgrade the power grid, that modernize transportation. We don't need to spend way above market wages for public employees so they can spend their money on minimum wage restaurant workers while using their health care benefits to cure their upset stomachs from gorging themselves to obesity. In fact, by doing so, we will seal our further demise as these public employees gain even more political power to further enrich themselves. We need to maintain and upgrade our infrastructure. We need to modernize education so all can have free access to K-14 courses in schools designed for The 21st Century Student and their parents.
Alex Wynnyczuk is a retired economics professor. He lives in Troy.
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