Yesterday, a Buffalo News editorial talked about the high cost of government in New York State, that costs us $73 for every $1000 of income. That’s 70% above the average rate of $43 per $1000. I have to admit, I thought the tax rate was actually higher.
So let’s say you are part of an average middle class family in North Buffalo. The husband is an IT guy at UB. The wife is a nurse at Millard Fillmore. You have two kids and a dog. Between the two of you, you bring in $100,000 a year to raise the family. New York gets $7300 of that money, between income taxes, property taxes, fees on your fishing license, and surcharges on your soda. What do you get for your $7300? Or, perhaps the better question is, what do you get for the extra $3000 premium ($7300 minus the US average of $4300) for the opportunity to live in the Great State of New York?
There are all kinds of snarky answers to this question. For once, I’m going to ignore the meltdown in the State Senate, obvious embezzlement of state politicians, kickbacks to local unions, duplication of services, and other giant wastes of money. Yes, much flies out the door with little obvious benefit (having both a Kenmore and Tonawanda police force, anyone?). But for our $3000 premium, we do get some things other places don’t. And they are often things we take for granted in Western New York.
My best frame of reference is Las Vegas, a model of South Western boom, where I lived from 2005 to 2007. Taxes are much lower in Las Vegas. Much much lower. As in, the value of my house in Vegas used to be twice my Grand Island house, but the property taxes were one fourth as much. What do you get for one fourth the taxes? Lots of private business, but not much else.
There aren’t enough cops or jails in Las Vegas, which leads to lots of problems. Not only does violent crime occur throughout the “good” and “bad” suburbs all over the valley, but misdemeanors are ignored, and they considered building a tent jail on the sewer plant to save money. Eventually, they contracted out the building of a new jail, only to decide last month to not open or staff it because they can’t afford to operate it.
Many streets in suburban Las Vegas are two lanes of asphalt and two lanes of dirt – its not economically possible to pave all the required roadways. My son’s public school was more like a holding pen, but private schools (not being subsidized like in NY) were either unavailable or astronomically expensive. Even the Lutherans wanted $5000 a kid for elementary school. Public parks are mostly unavailable, so they are provided by Home Owners Associations (with HOA fees – not technically taxes, but a cost of living most places).
The Arts and Culturals mostly don’t exist, and the Las Vegas Art Museum just shut down. Major issue – no public funding. Priceless quote from the former executive director: “Maybe I missed the readiness of Las Vegas to move in the direction of an urban metropolis.” Ouch.
Life is Las Vegas is much worse for the poor, where Medicaid is nearly broke, low-income children leave the state for care, and clinics regularly turn away patients.
Contrast this in your mind with the general WNY experience, where we are growing healthcare options and accessibility, school scores are improving, we have expanding arts and culturals, and crime has been greatly reduced. I am a proud Republican, but I believe government is not always the problem, and has a positive role to play in society. Is our NY and WNY government worth the extra $3000 premium? You tell me.
The Buffalo Record 
There might be hope for you yet, Mr.Castner. There just might be hope…
You aren’t wrong, but you’re definitely being awfully one-sided.
Unfortunately, you can’t ignore all those annoyingly expensive things you listed in your third paragraph unless they too exist in Vegas – do they? Perhaps it’s true that we can’t function the same by being taxed the same as the people in Vegas, but maybe we could function the same by being taxed only 30% more instead of 70% more.
Not to mention that Vegas is the last town I would consider “a model of South Western boom” …it’s obvious that Vegas has a very clear focus on maintaining very few parts of town and that everything else falls to the wayside. Even Tempe, AZ would be a better example- but I would love to see an article comparing us to a city like Indianapolis or Charlotte.
Chris – I’m not sure I should take that as a compliment! Saying government has a role to play is different from saying government should fix all of my problems for me, oh progressive one.
JoeS – Of course I’m one sided. My point isn’t that everywhere has the same problems. Its actually exactly the opposite. Problems in Buffalo are solved in Las Vegas. Problems in Vegas are solved in Buffalo. A major one I failed to mention is water – massive issue in Nevada, where Lake Mead has dropped 25 ft in the last decade, and its projected to NEVER GET BETTER.
So, looking at my third paragraph again, Las Vegas and Nevada: 1) have a broken legislature, and a 33% shortfall in the state budget – that being said, no legisltaure can compare to ours for dysfunction, 2) have their share of crooked politicians, including a Senator known as “Dirty Harry” and a Govenor with an approval rating of about 5%, 3) have massive union enrollment, but mostly in the service industry in the casinos, because no where can compare with the size and scope of NY’s public sector unions, and 4) LV doesn’t duplicate services, because it rarely provides them in the first place. However, Clark County does just about everything, and functions as a fairly effective regional government, compared to us. I would also say LV is a good example for the southwest boom, because while casinos lure workers, the construction industry was the real engine. Housing issues have been significantly magnified in LV.
I would like to compare us to Indianapolis or Charlotte, but I haven’t lived there, and don’t travel there frequently. But if you stick around reading the blog, I plan on doing a series of stories on how Buffalo does compare to the many places I do travel. I’ve done Fayetteville, NC previously. I’m in Savannah now – look for that this weekend.
Well, I have visited those “nice” gated communities in the south where taxes are almost nil….
Except, instead of paying public taxes they pay private ones. Home Owners Association fees for the roads, park like settings. A private security force (ie police), a private safety force (ie fire), separate fees for their golf courses, separate fees for their garbage, sewer, water. Separate fees for things like mail delivery, and the luxury taxes for their cars, boats, etc.
They pay private taxes and don’t count them as such. But that is what they are. Fees for services. Yes there is waste here in NY, but a clear picture would balance all those private fees.
Some questions come to mind:
If quality of life in WNY is really much higher than the national average QOL due to better govt services here, then logically wouldn’t that be expected to have had a strongly positive impact on WNY population over the years?
Are Las Vegas anecdotes typical of level of services elsewhere for comparison? (I realize you didn’t claim they are.) For one thing, according the link below Nevada is at the total opposite end of the spectrum for per capita combined state and local taxes: NYS is #2 at 11.7%, Nevada is #49 at 6.6%.
Click to access sr163.pdf
There’s 46 states in between, so I wonder how our much higher priced govt services compare to states in the middle of that ranking or even to some below the middle. I doubt the cost difference is much to do with our number of politicians either, but more to do with entitlement spending and many different extra costs that trace back to very strong union power here.
Other relevant issues might include to what extent Nevada and Vegas state/local govts allocate and manage their tax revenues competently, and how much impact their very rapid growth has had on aggravating their lousy services (assuming that they have lousy govt services generally).
@ Starbuck – I did not intentionally pick the #2 and #49, but its interesting it worked our that way. And you ask reasonable questions I can’t answer – call me when I’m done with the dissertation to sort out the multi-variable questions you ask. But I’ll give you my opinion on the first question: I think WNY’s woe-is-me culture, along with a natural human tendency to accept the status quo, means WNYers do not notice a higher quality of life. Expat’s notice when they post on websites like here or BRO, and say how much they miss ___________. But day to day there is no appreciation. On GI, where I live, I can put out tree limbs all year long, and the town comes by and chips them for me. If I want some wood chips for my flower beds, I call the town and they bring them for free. This has saved me buying a $1000 chipper (I have a lot of trees), and mulch for the garden. Do my neighbors appreciate this benny daily, and list it as a reason to stay in WNY? I doubt it.
The problem is with all the stuff you chose to ignore in your analysis. Nobody wants to pay $3000 for waste. If you’re paying the lowest taxes and have some “inefficiencies” with the services provided with those taxes, you write it off. You’re paying privately for other services that you have more direct control over, and can easily get rid of the provider of that service if they’re not meeting their responsibilties.
Up here, where all the services are rolled into one big public bundle, you not only lose your influence over the performance of the service providers (special interests have the control) but there is more opportunity for the waste and corruption to creep in.
But the politicians entrusted with overseeing and providing these services do not have it in their best interest to eliminate the waste, because it benefits them directly. So they spin the need for high taxes as necessary for your libraries, parks, and culturals, when in reality those are the most insignificant portion of the public budget.
So, the answer to your question is “no” – we’re not getting $3000 worth of more services. We’re getting $3000 worth of embezzlement, kickbacks, duplication of services, and rich politicians.
My comment noted that you weren’t claiming NY vs. Nevada is a typical comparison, but maybe my other wording seemed to be criticizing you for including Vegas anecdotes. FWIW, I didn’t intend it that way. Was just adding perspective.
The multi-variable Q’s weren’t asking for definitive answers but responding to the “Is the $3000/year worth the services here?” using other mostly rhetorical questions as “answers”.
My gut feel is WNY’s overall local services probably aren’t much better than in states at or near median rates of state/local taxes, even though things like G.I.’s delivery of free wood chips are nice (and btw, a good argument in favor of having local municipalities like the town of G.I. where voters can evaluate such priorities via board members they choose; maybe with a countywide regional govt a service like that would have to be either nowhere or everywhere along with additional county workers and their pensions).
What my gut bases that on is discussions I’ve seen over the years about the NYS budget’s much higher than average per capita growth, pension commitments, and spending mandates to county and local govts. Those make me suspect the lion’s share of extra taxes go to entitlements and public worker per-employee costs.