labor cost drive RE taxes

Just because you allow your employer to screw YOU out of a defined benefit pension plan and modest (extremely modest) 2% COLA raises does not mean everyone else should be screwed as well.

Union's worked hard for the right to retire @ age 50. New York politicians need the union vote, so you'll just have to pay your 10% real estate increase. Anything else is Un-American.

Matt I am not sure I understand your point- A strike is a better solution to the employees than a 2% increase and a defined benefit pension? Should one raise the offer to the employees and charge you more? Are you willing to pay higher taxes? if yes, please define how high are you willing to add (%) every year to your tax bill? I just read that the majority of americans would like to see spending cut rather than tax increase. Please answer concretley about your willingness to pay more and define it in annual terms!

"I just read that the majority of americans would like to see spending cut rather than tax increase."

Cutting spending does not mean screwing over essential city employees.

Cutting spending means government getting out of the business of providing non-essential amenities like swimming pools and libraries.

libraries are non-essential!? really!? the budget for NYPL is TINY! $33 million and it benefits taxpayers more than providing health care benefits to retirees that they themselves might not be entitled to.

Somehow my local library has gone into the business of renting movies. I'm not sure I'm happy my tax dollars are well spent. I draw a huge distinction between books and movie DVD's.

Libraries are non-essential for CITY GOVERNMENT. I'm sorry, but it's not the government's job to provide amenities like libraries. This is something best left to private companies or foundations.

And $33 million NOT BEING SPENT is a hell of a lot of money.

33 million is chump change compared to pensions and benefits.

It's like cutting out soda and then leasing an SUV, and saying you had austerity. school children and the elderly amongst may others benefit from our libraries. Plus it's a good place for conspiracy addicts to uncover government plots.

> And $33 million NOT BEING SPENT is a hell of a lot of money.

for you, but for the nyc budget is less than a drop in the bucket:

for 2010: "The city is forking out $6.8 billion for pensions and $7.3 billion on health insurance and fringe benefits this year, a total $14.1 billion — about 22% of its $63 billion budget."

compare NYPL with healthcare (pension checks are guaranteed, but health care benefits can be reduced to $0 if needed):

$ 7.3 billion health care benefits is around 30 times more than the $250 million public library budget ($33million was the 2009 budget cut, my bad there). is like saying "$3,000 is a lot of money but $100 too". true, but you are not going to arrive to the $3,000 of unnecessary spending by cutting $100 that are being well spent.

The New York City Budget

http://www.nyc.gov/html/omb/downloads/pdf/fp11_10.pdf

Matt- I am still waiting to read how much you are willing to increase your annual taxes. Please do not write B.S about libraries. Man up and tell us how much more taxes you are willing to contribute for the poor underpaid union?

"I just read that the majority of americans would like to see spending cut rather than tax increase."

No you didn't. You did not read that. People want spending that DOES NOT AFFECT THEM to be cut.

If you think NY taxes are too high, your free to leave. Go move to Texas.

For instance, if everyone used birth control, we could cut education spending. This is the latest idea from thew new chancellor. I can't wait for her next brilliant idea.

Please define "essential city employees". Why shouldn't everyone receive a defined benefits plan? Why do municipal employees have that as an essential perk? What would the majority of New Yorkers want - city libraries or a retired city worker receiving $90,000+ at age 55?

sjtmd, are you really asking this? sorry, not meaning to be demeaning, but the reason that public employees have such generous defined benefit plans is two-fold: one they thought the plans would be self-funding due to increases in value (which they should have been, defined benefit plans require little increase in value to be self-funding, but...), and two, because they agreed to reduced pay etc. in return for the pension benefits.

how many retirees receive $90k at 55? i have to say that i think firefighters should receive a full pension at the age when they are no longer able to scale burning walls.

You know, instead of spending yor time on SE b*tching about overpaid city workers, you could take the civil service test and become a city worker yourself.

But be quick about it ... Boston Bloomberg wants to replace civil service exams with an exciting new program of patronage and crony-capitalism.

Also known as "Heck of a job, Blackie!"

firefighters are grossly overpaid. sorry. lazy bums.give the job to illegals ....and save money.

Great idea nicercatch. I hope you have a fire extinguisher when the FDNY response time is 2 hours.

they do a good job...but are grossly overpaid. just like any city employee (who doesn't do a good job)

>"I just read that the majority of americans would like to see spending cut rather than tax increase."
>No you didn't. You did not read that. People want spending that DOES NOT AFFECT THEM to be cut.

Hard to argue with you on that last statement, but what percentage of spending really doesn't affect the actual people paying the majority of the taxes, since many taxpayers are not the recipients of many forms of spending. And how can we account for the spending that benefits only past providers or services and not today's providers of services?

>If you think NY taxes are too high, your free to leave. Go move to Texas.
>For instance, if everyone used birth control, we could cut education spending. This is the latest idea from thew new chancellor. I can't wait for her next brilliant idea.

Or we could have unlimited children, right?

>But be quick about it ... Boston Bloomberg wants to replace civil service exams with an exciting new program of patronage and crony-capitalism.
>Also known as "Heck of a job, Blackie!"

What year did Bloomberg move to NYC and pay taxes in NYC? If only native NYers are permitted, what happens to our immigrant base?

"they do a good job...but are grossly overpaid."

Right. The guy running into burning buildings to save lives is grossly overpaid compared to the $160,000 a year BigLaw associate pushing papers.

"Somehow my local library has gone into the business of renting movies."

How do you know they rent movies? You went to the library recently? Did you take anything out? I thought liberatrians don't use libraries. After all, libraraies are SOCIALIST since they re-distribute books.

In San Deigo, you can get $227,000/year for being a librarian...

union thuggery at its finest..

http://www.sandiego6.com/news/local/story/San-Diego-Pension-Scandal-Called-Worse-Than-Bell/iVFlhMOZWECMOs8JWq0u_g.cspx

in NJ you have 2X2 municipalities next to each other EACH with their own library staff with overlapping unchecked out books and resources.. and people wonder why NJ taxes lead the nation..

everything's online nowadays..

"in NJ you have 2X2 municipalities next to each other EACH with their own library staff with overlapping unchecked out books and resources"

The mayors are the ones who don't want to consolidate services, not the unions.

"but what percentage of spending really doesn't affect the actual people paying the majority of the taxes, since many taxpayers are not the recipients of many forms of spending."

The bulk of federal spending goes toward entitlements and defense, which affects everyone. If you don't get an eentitlement today, you will one day.

Socialist- I am still waiting to read your (and all others) proposal on the solution and personal annual tax increase YOU are willing to pay (10% or perhaps 100%). Give us all an answer! You argue and avoid the answers. RE taxes are a source of income for NYC. How high do you want them to go as well as the city taxes. Do you support a VAT? whats your money producing solution to support the unionanized work force? stop your passionate BS! answer!

What's not realized by far too many are the hand-outs given to many of the middle class at the expense of others..many of which are other middle class
--------------------------------

What's interesting about tax expenditures, I think, is that they're basically the welfare state for the middle class, cleverly arranged such that they don't look like the welfare state for the middle class. If every year, the government sent every American -- from the richest CEO to the greenest public-school teacher -- a check covering 30 percent of their health-care costs, we'd think that a bit weird. We'd think it much weirder if we only sent the checks to the workers who happened to be at firms that offered benefits. It would certainly make it very difficult to argue that we shouldn't be subsidizing health-care insurance for the poor and the jobless.

Yet that's pretty much exactly what we do. We just hide it in the tax code rather than write it on a check. And because we hide it in the tax code, the people who're benefiting don't really know they're benefiting. They think the poor are getting all this help and they're paying for it. In reality, the lost revenue from the tax exclusion for employer-based health care is significantly larger than the entire cost of the health-care reform bill. And it messes up the system in countless other ways.

And don't even get me started on the mortgage-interest deduction. We've basically made it national policy in this country to get people to spend more money on health-care insurance and housing than they otherwise would, and we've done it at great expense to taxpayers. Harrumph.

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/2011/01/the_welfare_state_for_the_midd.html

Everything is working exactly as it should. Those who organize and unite get what they want over those that are less organized. Organize better. If you can't beat them, join them. If neither is an option, set yourself on fire.

Those who are "organized" are good at making back room deals.

007, Socialist is willing to pay any % higher since he benefits of it - ie property taxes fuel his salary, pensions, benefits disproportionately since their are less recipients (public workers) vs contributors (everyone)..

for him and his public union gig, pay 75 cents, receive a buck.. for everyone else pay 75 cents, pay an additional 50 cents for 'administrative fees' on top of that.. repeat next year.

I have a sense that Socialist is a union's organizer. He posts on this board any perhaps many others for PR reasons.(like Palin and twitter). He will make cynical comments on others' posts but will never be accountable for his arguments.I think that unions have lost political support and we shall see more strikes (which only leads to further depressed employment numbers and business losses) until expenses by government will eventually go down. It is a shame that union inflicts so much pain on its members and society.

yeh and he's not even that good at hiding his agenda..

...ie stevejhx was decent in scaring purchasers on here to subtly lure them to his RENTAL website to make a killing on rental comi$$ion$$$.

...then steve became too obvious by just posting his rental website outright...cha-chinnng!

ill give steve props in that he was a bit underhanded in the beginning by pimping the likes of julia on here to rent for life (at a smallll commis$$ion of cour$$$e).... whereas socialist was just plain obvious from the beginning..

Where did the idea of stevejhx as rental agent come from? Or am I missing a joke?

not a rental agent..

he owns a rental website and makes commmi$$$hh of renters.

..by trying to pimp the julias of the board to be lifelong renters..cha-chingg

search the older threads, he's admitted to it

Good for him

hol4, you're just wrong. stevejhx certainly does not own NYBits.com.

wow. steve has been on this board for years, he is an amateur (sorry steve if you consider yourself a pro, but as i understand it it's secondary to your other job) stand-up comedian who has a degree or two from columbia in i think languages and literature and has his own translation business, spanish to english primarily i believe, and does a lot of work for law firms. he likes his apartment, more than many think he should, and he doesn't really find buying or LIC to be his cup of tea right now (LIC ever, actually). what has he admitted to, exactly, owning a rental website (the one you're talking about is no-fee, no less, no commission), or encouraging julia to rent?

julia doesn't need any of us to pimp renting to her. love her to bits, but she never seems to focus on anything that actually closes within her range. i think because she is still conflicted she only looks at properties at current ask, and finds them wanting. that's a-ok, because i too don't think it's wise to invest in the small-unit markets right now.

who said anything about nybits?

LOL. I think we just saw a strawman in action.

okay hol4, maybe you had some subtle message? sorry, you don't seem the type.

"I think we just saw a strawman in action."

says ad hominem