NY – CYA Later – Is Commuter Tax a Deal Breaker? [POLL]

On a day when some voters in New Jersey municipalities are pondering exceeding the 2 percent cap on local property taxes comes word that the Manhattan borough president is suggesting a commuter tax be restored for suburbanites who commute to work in the city.

Sort of like a shakedown. You work here, you pay us for the privilege of working here.

NYC, the kickback city.

I could remember a time when one of the stations I worked for moved from a very prestigious address.

1700 Broadway.

In the heart of midtown Manhattan!

Right across from the “David Letterman Theatre”.

Before Letterman moved in, the area was blighted. East 54th St. had a welfare hotel adjacent to the theatre, which itself had been abandoned for a time before that other "Late Show" moved in.

Parking cost an arm and a leg; and the payroll tax meant that any of us who didn't live within the confines of New York City would come home with less in our paychecks.

In early 1994, the radio station, due to rising costs and incentives from Jersey City, decided to move to more spacious headquarters across the river and directly in front of the Newport Center Mall.

The drawback?

There was nothing there. Nothing! Just some tumbleweeds, a very lonely stretch of Washington Blvd. and the Newport Pavonia PATH station.

And who wanted to be in the “glamour” business of radio working at a Jersey City address.

it was like being a stevedore!

However, the immediate benefit was the increase I saw in my paycheck.

And while it was a prudent move at the time, and probably still would be, that station and a bunch of others owned by the same company decided to pack up and head back across the river to set up shop.

Why?

Because of having the "prestige" of the NYC address.

“Vanity….definately my favorite sin!” The final line Al Pacino utters in the movie, Devil’s Advocate!

But something you pay for in the end (literally and figuratively!)