Name: Editorial: A comfort for the rich
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Editorial: A comfort for the rich

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THE ISSUE:Gov. Andrew Cuomo rules out taxing billionaires to solve New York's deficits.THE STAKES:Without federal help, the burden will fall on those less able to shoulder it.More InformationTo comment:When it comes to taxing the very rich, Gov. Andrew Cuomo's logic is essentially this: It won't close the state's massive deficits, so let's not do it.Come again, governor?Isn't every state budget built on an array of revenue — income tax, sales tax, excise tax, a veritable universe of fees? The state already taxes people at all income levels — the working poor, the middle class, the rich, the super rich. No one tax or fee alone covers the whole $177 billion state budget.So the real question is, when revenue falls short, what are the various options for the state to make it up?And a whopper of a deficit it is expected to be: $30 billion this year and next, or $50 billion, Mr. Cuomo says, when you add in New York City, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.To solve it all with a billionaires' tax, the governor warns, would require half a billion from each of New York's 100-plus billionaires. "That means you would have no billionaires," he says, almost apocalyptically.That's logic worthy of a tea party acolyte, not a pragmatically progressive governor. First, it isn't really true: There actually are people in this state who could pay such a tax and have billions left over.But nobody is talking about extracting a half-billion dollars from any individual taxpayer. What's in question is whether the super-rich should pick up more of the tax burden that we all share. In fact, they should.Read the latest Times Union opinion, perspective and letters to the editor on Mondays by signing up for our Observation Deck newsletter.Mr. Cuomo would prefer a different panacea — for the federal government to bail out state and local governments from the fiscal crisis they're in as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. He's right on that, but President Donald Trump, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and their fellow Republicans so far are resisting.Yet if ever there was a time for the one level of government that can print money to shore up the economy — until, hopefully, a vaccine is ready and the economy can stabilize — this is it.Mr. Cuomo's Plan B is to cut spending on education, health care and other services. A cut to schools or hospitals or child food programs alone also won't close the deficit, of course, but that doesn't seem as much of a deal killer to Mr. Cuomo as is taxing the rich.Advocates argue that an array of new taxes on the wealthy — small taxes on stock transfers and multimillion-dollar second homes, and progressively higher taxes on ultra-millionaires and billionaires — could close the gap. Studies, they note, have found that most wealthy people generally don't move because of taxes.A recent Forbes analysis found that New York's billionaires' wealth grew by $77 billion in the first three months of the pandemic. Hardly the hard times nearly 1.5 million unemployed are going through these days. You know, the ones who suddenly need the services Mr. Cuomo would cut, since taxing the rich won't solve everything.Somehow, in Mr. Cuomo's pragmatic progressive calculation, railing against Washington, and squeezing services taxpayers need, will.Read the latest Times Union opinion, perspective and letters to the editor on Mondays by signing up for our Observation Deck newsletter.

THE ISSUE:Gov. Andrew Cuomo rules out taxing billionaires to solve New York's deficits.THE STAKES:Without federal help, the burden will fall on those less able to shoulder it.More InformationTo comment:When it comes to taxing the very rich, Gov. Andrew Cuomo's logic is essentially this: It won't close the state's massive deficits, so let's not do it.Come again, governor?Isn't every state budget built on an array of revenue — income tax, sales tax, excise tax, a veritable universe of fees? The state already taxes people at all income levels — the working poor, the middle class, the rich, the...

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