THESE ARE NOT, FOR THE MOST PART, INDIVIDUALS BUT SMALL ‘MOM-N-POP’ BUSINESSES, DAYCARES AND SUCH…WHICH WILL HAVE TO CLOSE IF TAXES ON THEM ARE RAISED.
VERY POOR JOB OF REPORTING HERE….
Findings
The number of New York state workers making more than $100,000 grew by 328 percent between 2000 and 2010. The state’s highest-paid employees represented only about 12 percent of the roughly 200,000-member state work force. SUNY led the state in number of employees earning more than $100,000 last year, with 5,623. The average compensation for state employees is $66,600.
Related Links
What’s at stake
New York state’s fiscal stability, how much it pays its employees and whether it is competitive with the private sector in its pay rates.
Click on this article for a searchable database of New York workers who earn more than $100,000 a year.
Written by Joseph Spector and Cathey O’Donnell
ALBANY — The number of state workers earning more than $100,000 a year grew nearly 5 percent in 2010, to a total of 24,807 employees, state records show.
In fact, the number of state workers making more than $100,000 grew by 328 percent between 2000 and 2010, from 5,800 to 24,807.
While the highest-paid employees represented only about 12 percent of the roughly 200,000-member state work force, some employees raked in big bucks that far exceeded the average pay for state workers, a review by Gannett’s Albany bureau found.
The top earner in 2010 was former SUNY Binghamton basketball coach Kevin Broadus, who received $1 million as part of a settlement with the school last year over the its scandal-plagued team.
Fourteen state employees earned more than $500,000, most of whom worked at the Downstate Medical Center, a public medical school in Brooklyn. Thirty of the top 36 highest-paid employees worked at the school, with Stephen Onesti, a professor and chairman of the neurosurgery department at the school, earning $974,605 — second only to Broadus.
But school officials said those employees are doctors whose salaries are largely funded through charges to patients and tuition for students, and the salaries are in line with doctors at private facilities.
Alain Kaloyeros, vice president and chief administrative officer of the College of Nanoscale Science and Engineering at SUNY Albany, ranked third at $763,289. In all, 622 employees earned more than $200,000 in 2010, records from the state Comptroller’s Office showed. The median salary of those earning more than $100,000 was $117,663 last year.
Union officials said the high earners aren’t reflective of the average salary for state employees. For example, workers with the Civil Service Employees Association, which represents about 300,000 employees, have an average salary of $40,000 a year, pay a portion for their health insurance and contribute to a pension that on average pays $14,000 a year when they retire, a spokesman said.
For workers with the United University Professions, which represents 30,000-faculty members at SUNY campuses, the average pay is about $61,300.
Don Felstein, a UUP spokesman, said the high salaries are not the norm but those that receive them “merit salaries that are commensurate with other members of their profession, whether they are in the private sector or not.”
The average compensation for state employees is $66,600, and 94 percent of the state work force is unionized, according to state budget documents.
Some business groups knocked the high salaries, saying it is illustrative of a state that has yet to cut back on its salaries and benefits for public employees.
The state faces a $10 billion deficit in the fiscal year that starts April 1, and employees’ salaries and benefits make up about 18 percent of the state’s $60 billion operating budget. The Citizens Budget Commission, a watchdog group, estimated last month that state salaries are expected to grow by 19 percent over the next four years, adding $2.8 billion to the state’s budget gaps.
Brian Sampson, executive director of Unshackle Upstate, a business group, said the state cannot sustain the growth in salaries. The group released a report in 2009 that showed across upstate, salaries for state and local government employees were 10 percent higher than the private-sector average.
“It counters the argument that they say that people in the public sector don’t get paid as well as people in the private sector,” he said.
The growth in the number of $100,000-a-year earners is also due to union contracts, most of which are in the final year of their four-year contract and expire in April. The final year included a 4 percent raise for most workers, as well as cost-of-living and longevity increases for some others.
The contracts have meant that most unionized workers saw their salaries increase by at least 14 percent over the past four years, according to budget documents.
There were 72 high earners who held three or more titles or worked at various state facilities in 2010. For example, nurse Elaine Maggiore earned $124,796 last year, state records shows, after she worked at five lower Hudson Valley correctional facilities.
Gov. Andrew Cuomo has called for a one-year wage freeze for state employees and is seeking $550 million in concessions from unions. He has threatened up to 9,800 layoffs if a deal isn’t reached.
The moves come after the state laid off about 900 workers last year under former Gov. David Paterson, implemented early retirement programs and didn’t fill positions. The effort has reduced the state work force by about 11,000 positions in the agencies controlled by the governor since the 2007-08 fiscal year.
Layoffs at some agencies, such as SUNY, are out of the governor’s control. SUNY led the state in the number of employees earning more than $100,000 last year, with 5,623, Gannett’s review found.
The State Police had nearly 4,000 workers earning more than $100,000, followed by 3,004 at the City University of New York.
Cuomo has proposed cutting $135 million for the three SUNY teaching hospitals in Brooklyn, Stony Brook and Syracuse, which would be the total amount of state aid the facilities receive but represents only 8 percent of the hospitals’ total operating revenue.
SUNY officials said the high earners represent roughly 6 percent of the colleges’ 88,000 employees who serve 468,000 students at 64 campuses. The schools have dealt with $1.1 billion in aid cuts in recent years and a potential $362 million cut next fiscal year.
“We have made it a priority to efficiently manage our resources during these difficult economic times,” said SUNY spokesman Morgan Hook. “However, in order to train New York’s future doctors, teachers and business leaders, SUNY must be able to attract the best and brightest minds to instruct those students.”
http://www.democratandchronicle.com/article/20110228/NEWS01/102280315/More-state-workers-earning-100K
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What’s at stake
Whether to extend a tax surcharge on New York taxpayers who make more than $200,000 a year.
That in turn could affect the state’s fiscal crisis, not to mention a promise Gov. Cuomo made not to raise taxes or add fees.
Cry to keep taxing New York’s ‘rich’ is rising
“Of those Monroe County residents, 481 made more than $1 million in income that year, and 1,020 made between $500,000 and $1 million.”
PREVIOUS REPORT ON THE “RICH”
TAX THE RICH IN New York: Seems there aren’t that many rich…ONLY 64 thousand families making $500,000+ According to STAR… http://www.democratandchronicle.com/article/20110220/NEWS01/102200347/State-struggles-ID-500K-earners
Are they rich?
The number of New York taxpayers making more than $200,000 in adjusted gross income in 2008 included 7,597 in Monroe County; 907 in Ontario County; 294 in Wayne County; 196 in Livingston County; 184 in Genesee County; and 70 in Orleans County.
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