Originally posted by ChrisPlatt I hope for your sake your employer never decides it would be more lucrative to move to another state, beyond your ability to commute or relocate...
Chris
Look outside of the NYC and downstate area Chris. This has already happened to the rest of the state. Business has been fleeing NY for decades. High taxes etc. A European company just announced plans to open a high tech facility in Utica, NY. It is promising something like 300 jobs for 15 years. The problem is that NY is spending $300,000,000 of taxpayer money to make it happen. Essentially NY is going to pay their wages for the next 15 years while a foreign company (and a few politicians) should make a lot of money.
When an already established business goes to the state to see if they can get a tax break they are refused. A local package printer with over 300 employees tried to get a bit of property tax relief. They were refused. The main company closed the facility and took all the work, and jobs, to their North Carolina facility.
A recent news spot on a local television station touted a local company expanding and adding all of four new full time jobs!!! This is big news up here.
While the economy in the city may look good, the rest of the state is hurting big time. The loss of almost 60,000 jobs at Kodak in Rochester was not just because of declining film sales. Over 20,000 of those, including mine, were areas other than film. Kodak used to do a lot of things that people were never aware of. They were either relocated outside of NY or sold off to companies outside of the state. A lot of those jobs went to Mexico. Nothing like seeing long term employees having to train their replacements knowing that when the training is done, so is their career. If they did not do this they were to be laid off without the normal compensation package.
Upstate and Western NY is shedding people at a pretty good clip. And these are the working people looking for jobs to support their families. Retirees are leaving in droves too. All taking their spending with them. It's just to darn expensive to live here. College graduates don't stay either. No opportunities here. While the local governments keep touting how great it is to live in NY, they fail to mention that in order to live that lifestyle you need a decent job to do it. Not a lot of those up here to go around. NY used to have 45 representatives in Congress. Now it is down to 27 and it looks like we will lose more after the next census.
As much as the governor says "New York is open for business", it doesn't mean that people want to come here to run one. It is not a business friendly state.
Sadly, what is happening at B&H has been the norm for the rest of the state for some time now.