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Comment by PaulHoule | Hacker News Reader

As a New Yorker, I think this sucks.

We already pay high taxes and if somebody gets a tax break that means all the rest of us will pay even more.

Better the tax breaks go to startups and new businesses than to bureaucracies and large corps.

There currently seems to be no shortage of startups in NYC, even without these tax breaks. And if a company only comes to NY because of the tax breaks, they might leave when the tax breaks expire.

I had the same thought until I realized that Human capital is a lot harder to move than buildings. Yes, it's possible to move a company away from a city, but 10 years is a long time. Long enough that a company would lose a ton of employees by moving out of state.

What about your average, everyday, not new, small business? If low taxes are good all of the sudden, why not lower them for everybody?

Make taxes higher, I say. I hope to one day have a New York City entirely funded by its full-time residents, so we can stop pretending to care about tourists.

A huge percentage of full-time residents work in the tourist industry (e.g., hotels, theaters, museums, etc.). And a lot of NYC business sectors would be much smaller without the tourist population, like restaurants and retail stores. Without the tourists, there would be a lot of unemployed New Yorkers.

The tears... they just aren't coming.

Why? What about tourists makes New York so intolerable for you? Is your desk in Times Square?

Their collective inability to stay on the pedestrian side of the Brooklyn Bridge. One time, I saw a couple getting married in the bike lane! WTF?

Wow, I can see how that must ruin your life and make the entire city intolerable.

Brooklyn Bridge is basically second only to Times Square in terms of tourist nonsense. If you bike you really ought to be taking the Manhattan Bridge.

Is there a provision that actually raises some tax along with this tax break?

it can't be higher than Vancouver, BC.

Tax Payable on Earning 150k:

$$20,127 CAD (New York) $45,624 CAD (Vancouver, BC) 1.07 (USD/CAD)

Is that $45K total Canadian taxes on it or just what you pay to BC?

$150K CAD ($140K USD) in NYC will result in you paying ~$58K CAD ($55K USD) in taxes between City, State and Federal.

Where I live (The Netherlands) that would be 52%, so $78,000. Sweden is even worse with 57% ($85,500), but the Swedish have way better incentives like (almost) free education/healthcare etc.

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