Albany (the capital of New York, the Empire State) has been called “Planet Albany”, as in, ‘What kind of planet are these legislators on?”

From Capitol Confidential:

Megna: We’re out of money in June
April 9, 2010 at 3:01 pm by Rick Karlin
Gov. Paterson’s Budget Director Robert Megna just held a press briefing at the Capitol and he reiterated the governor’s earlier prediction that the state will basically run out of cash in early June. “Even with hitting our (revenue) projections we run out of money the first week of June,” Megna said explaining that period marks a troubling convergence: School aid payments, including the $2.1 billion that were delayed last month, are due as are Medicaid reimbursements .

At the same time, the state by then won’t have tallied all of its income and sales tax revenue and it will have just finished paying out income tax refunds in May.

“Our cash flow problems are unprecedented,” said Megna, who said he couldn’t rule out the prospect of some short term borrowing — a practice that was supposed to have disappeared with budget reforms in the early 1990s.

Wonderful. A typical comment:

The unions will not make concessions adequate for what NY needs. Paterson will not do what is necessary. The legislature will do nothing as usual. This IS Albany.
Comment by Rolio — April 10th, 2010 @ 8:03 am

Here’s a big example of what’s bankrupting New York–the teachers unions–from Sunday’s New York Post:

NY school spending doesn’t add up
Why it’s out of control
By Raymond J. Keating
Posted: 2:36 AM, April 11, 2010
During the state budget crisis, lawmakers moan that there’s simply nothing that can be cut. Yet during the fat times, the budget increased at rates far greater than inflation. Begging the question — why does it cost so much more to run New York than it did 10 years ago?

Let’s take just one category, spending on public schools, where the numbers are staggering — and, from a taxpayer’s perspective, deeply distressing.
(…)
Total per-pupil public school spending hit $19,350 in 2008-09, up from $10,356 in 1998-99. Unsurprisingly, New York’s spending is the most lavish compared to the other states. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, no other state spent more than New York, which exceeded the US average by 66%.
(…)
New York, by the way, had the second-highest average public school teacher salary among the states in 2008-09, at $64,336 — which exceeds the US average by 21%.

NYS public employees recently got 4% pay raises. The NY Daily News said it was no April Fools joke:

Pay raises for state workers is no April Fool’s Day joke for Gov. Paterson
Bill Hammond

Friday, April 2nd 2010, 4:00 AM
If you run into any state workers today, be sure to congratulate them on the 4% raises they just got – despite the worst fiscal crisis to slam New York in generation.

They darn well ought to thank you back, because the rest of us are going to suffer for their good fortune.

That nice bump for 120,000 unionized employees will cost Albany $433 million it simply doesn’t have right now, given the gaping $9 billion hole in its budget.
(…)
The two main unions for state workers – the Civil Service Employees Association and the Public Employees Federation – were predictably unmoved. They flatly refuse to discuss giving up anything – not the raises averaging $2,560 per member, not their Cadillac health insurance for life, not their plush pensions, not their short work week, generous overtime or copious days off.
(…)
Paterson and legislative leaders should be demanding with one voice that CSEA and PEF renegotiate contracts that make no sense in a major recession. They should put layoffs back on the table. And they should get ready declare a fiscal emergency and freeze pay by statute if the unions don’t talk turkey.

There’s been a little kerfluffle about that. The NYS fiscal year ends March 31st, and the new budget must be ready by April 1st. It’s almost always late, and an emergency bill is required. From the New York Times:

Paterson Says He’ll Suspend Pay Raises for Workers
By NICHOLAS CONFESSORE and JEREMY W. PETERS
Published: April 8, 2010
ALBANY — Gov. David A. Paterson said Thursday that he would unilaterally withhold scheduled pay raises for thousands of state workers because New York had too little cash to afford them.

The decision, which public employee unions are likely to challenge in court, came after union leaders refused to renegotiate a contract with the state that granted union workers a 4 percent raise beginning on April 1.

The governor and state lawmakers are struggling to close a $9 billion state budget gap and have yet to agree on a new budget, which is now more than a week overdue. A series of emergency bills, containing short-term appropriations for essential government functions, have kept the state in business since the fiscal year ended on March 31.

Mr. Paterson will suspend the raises by including no money for them in his next emergency bill, which the Legislature will probably pass in the next few days.

So that’s the situation NYS and Planet Albany now finds itself. The state will run out of cash by June, but darn it, the public employees want their 4% raises and they want them now and it’s an emergency and screw the taxpayers and everyone else.

Making matters worse is that the governor, David Paterson, has shown that he is a true moon of Planet Albany. From a New York Post editorial:

Death, taxes — and Dave
Posted: April 08, 2010
Everyone knows of life’s two certainties: death and taxes. In New York, there’s a third: death taxes.

And while not everyone might know about that last one, one person you’d surely expect to know is: the governor.

Unless that’s David Paterson.

Asked on a radio show yesterday if New York has an inheritance tax, Paterson stammered, then pleaded ignorance.

“Uh, currently, I think there’s a gap in the inheritance tax,” he said on the Brian Lehrer program.

“That’s the federal one,” Lehrer corrected him. “I don’t know if New York has one or not.”

“I don’t either,” Paterson admitted.

Astonishing.

Raymond J. Keating, on his blog, was astonished:

Friday, April 09, 2010
Death Tax? I Forgot
Sometimes you simply cannot make things up. In New York, Governor David Paterson was on the radio and revealed an astonishing gap in his knowledge about taxes.
(…)
No one should be surprised that taxes are so high in New York. Apparently, leading politicians cannot remember what taxes are already imposed.

Raymond J. Keating
Chief Economist
Small Business & Entrepreneurship Council

David Paterson has been in Albany for at least 25 years as a state senator, lieutenant governor, and governor, and he can’t tell you if New York State has a death tax?

How much of a joke is New York? These are your leaders who are raising your taxes?

Fortunately, the Working Families Party (ACORN+SEIU) is coming to the rescue with new tax ideas. Yes, I’ve mentioned the soda tax, but everyone’s doing that now. Meet the new “bonus tax,” supported by the WFP-controlled NYC Comptroller John Liu. The WFP’s Dan Cantor explained it all in The Huffington Post:

Time for a New York Bonus Tax: An Open Letter to Albany
Posted: April 6, 2010 04:39 PM
Dan Cantor
Executive Director of the Working Families Party
(…)
Our proposal:

A 25% tax on all bonuses worth more than $50,000 where the recipient’s total compensation is $250,000 or more.

The tax scales up to a 50% rate on all bonuses worth more than $50,000 where the recipient’s income exceeds $500,000.
(…)
It’s a matter of basic fairness.

Almost 50% of Americans pay no income taxes, and the 50% who do pay taxes must see their taxes increased to pay their “fair share” as “a matter of basic fairness.” It’s always that way.

Do you know what high wealth individuals will do? They will move to Florida or Texas in an instant! Do you think high wealth people are stupid? You don’t need to be on Wall Street anymore–you can do electronic transactions from anywhere. You’ll do them from the lowest taxed state.

This is the situation that New York finds itself in. I now live in Texas, watching with amazement at how the place I was born sinks to the very financial bottom.

There are lessons to be learned from this disaster, and leaders to be found and to step up.