ALBANY — More than 7.3 million people have left New York for other parts of the country since 1960, according to a new report issued this week by a fiscally conservative think tank.
The report from the Empire Center for New York State Policy, which was based on an analysis of census data, showed a steady exodus of New Yorkers over the past five decades, with 1.6 million leaving for other states from 2000 to 2010.
While those numbers were partially offset by a stream of foreign immigrants — 4.8 million since 1960 and 895,000 last decade — the numbers still show people are leaving the state at an alarming rate, said E.J. McMahon, senior fellow at the Empire Center.
“We’ve seen a slowdown in foreign immigration over the last decade, post-9/11,” McMahon said. “So you’re making up less of the domestic migration with foreign immigration, which means we basically had the worst decade we’ve seen since the (1970s).”
Percentage-wise, New York had more of its residents move between 2000 and 2010 than any other state, with 8.27 percent of its population packing up for different parts of the country, the report found.
The state’s net migration rate of -3.56, which factors in foreign immigrants who have moved into New York, was 48th out of 51 states, including the District of Columbia.
The rates vary across different parts of the state. Most rural counties, which have fewer immigrants, saw a steady out-migration. Orleans County, for example, saw 2,253 people leave for other states in the 2000s while welcoming just 124 from foreign countries.
Neighboring Monroe County saw 29,279 leave the state, with 13,040 immigrants moving in over the same time period. Dutchess County, in the Hudson Valley, saw the opposite, with 2,361 people moving out and 5,516 new immigrants.
New York City, meanwhile, saw a constant stream of both immigration and out-migration, seeing 1.1 million people leave while 690,000 immigrants moved in.
The state’s total population increased by 2.1 percent over the past decade — from 19 million to 19.4 million — but that can be chalked up to New York seeing more births than deaths over that time period, according to the report.
The slow growth rate has had an effect on New York’s political clout in Washington, with the state losing 10 congressional seats since 1980. Another two are on the chopping block for next year.
While the report indicates that New Yorkers are migrating in droves, figuring out why they’re leaving is more difficult to track down.

Brian Sampson, executive director of the Rochester-based business group Unshackle Upstate, said the state’s business climate has forced jobs out of state, leaving people with no other choice.
“We have a climate in New York, and specifically here in upstate New York, that has forced private-sector jobs to leave the state,” Sampson said. “When that happens, the people are going to go where the jobs are.”
But Frank Mauro, executive director of the union-backed Fiscal Policy Institute, said it’s not that simple. While the state’s population increase ranked 46th in the 2010 census, its overall job growth and personal income growth ranked in the middle of the pack, Mauro pointed out.
“The claim is often made that taxes are driving people and businesses from New York, yet absolutely no evidence is ever provided to back this up,” Mauro said in a recent report. “There are no studies that provide an empirically based analytical link between the migration behavior of New Yorkers and state and local taxes.”
Still, businesses and homeowners have long called for tax relief, and the Tax Foundation, a Washington, D.C.-based group, has consistently ranked New York at the bottom of the list when it comes to business climate.
McMahon said Gov. Andrew Cuomo has recognized that the state “is leaking” and said the governor’s policy agenda is an acknowledgment of that. Since Cuomo took office, the state Legislature has passed a property-tax cap and the governor’s office has launched a $1 billion economic development effort.
“We need to consider migration trends as the ultimate barometer of New York’s attractiveness as a place to live, work and do business,” McMahon said. “I think that as long as we are among the national leaders in exporting people, we’re doing some things wrong.”
JCAMPBELL1 http://www.democratandchronicle.com/article/20110804/NEWS01/108040335/

NYS is the number 1 ranked taxed state in the country when you include all of the local taxes and has some of the highest property taxes in the country and has rated the number one LEAST free state in the country by a recent study done at George Mason University. Ddo you what we need, to raise taxes on anyone making $250,000 and above for “shared sacrfice” of course. How is that liberal utopia working out NYS?