February 4, 2003. The Fiscal Policy Institute’s 13th annual budget briefing: analysis of Governor George E. Pataki’s Executive Budget and alternative approaches to balancing New York State’s 2003-2004 budget. Briefing book on the 2003-2004 executive budget >>
This PowerPoint version of the briefing book has most of the same charts and graphs but condenses the text with bullet points.
Despite Governor Pataki’s recent pronouncements regarding the relationship between jobs and cuts in broad based taxes, the large personal income tax cuts that New York implemented in 1987, 1988 and 1989 did not inoculate our state from the emerging national recession. In fact, New York and the rest of the Northeast were hit particularly hard by that recession – and New York went from positive (but weakening) employment growth in 1989 to employment declines during each of the next three years.
Now, after almost a decade of major changes in its fiscal policies, New York State is again confronting significant economic problems and related fiscal crises. And Governor Pataki, despite his statements about not repeating the failed policies of the past, is offering a plan for balancing the state’s budget that is very similar to the budget balancing strategies that were adopted by New York State in the early 1990s. FPI’s February 4 Budget Briefing reviews the roots of New York State’s current fiscal problems, Governor Pataki’s strategy for balancing the 2003-2004 budget, and alternative approaches to meeting this challenge.