NY's Broke

"Gov. David A. Paterson took the rare step on Monday of addressing a joint session of the Legislature during its traditional off-season and used the speech to underscore New York's deepening financial crisis. Mr. Paterson repeatedly used stark language to describe the gravity of the state's economic health as he prodded lawmakers to make cuts he has proposed to programs long considered sacrosanct. ... The state's budget crisis and the negotiations between the governor and lawmakers over how to confront it have raised a fundamental question: Can New York, which is more generous in its social welfare programs than any other state, afford to continue to finance its expansive health care safety net and generous education spending? ... A growing number of budget experts believe that New York can no longer afford to spend so much in the wake of the economic crisis, rising unemployment, the collapse of the stock market and the travails on Wall Street--the state's main fiscal engine. ... 'We're going to fall off a cliff unless we get our revenues and our expenditures in true sync,' said Lt. Gov. Richard Ravitch, the adminstration's point man in budget negotiations with the Legislature. He said that the state could no longer rely on its usual strategy of turning to an array of short-term solutions or ask more of the state's taxpayers, adding, 'We're at the outer limits of the elasticity of our tax system'," Danny Hakim at the NYT, 10 November 2009, link: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/10/nyregion/10paterson.html.

"Desperate for cash amid the worst fiscal crisis in years, New York State is pursuing tax debtors more aggressively than ever before, doubling the number of cases it is investigating and seeking to collect from delinquents ranging from JPMorgan Chase to an out-of-business convenience store on the Bowery. ... By the end of this year the state's Department of Taxation and Finance will have filed the largest number of warrants ever in a single year and settled about a million open cases, the most in state history", Nicholas Confessore at the NYT, 10 November 2009, link: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/10/nyregion/10taxes.html.

Quoted without comment.

There is no place in NY for the middle class. Leave.