Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, who has been criticized as being tone-deaf to the struggles of the poor, provoked more anger when he recently attributed New York’s rising income gap to the many rich people who have found the city an attractive place to live and called billionaires a “godsend.”
It turns out Mr. Bloomberg has a point.
There is no doubt that the city’s widening income gap, which is greater than the national rate and has been climbing for several years, reflects rising poverty.
But it has also grown, economists say, because more wealthy people have moved to the city since Mr. Bloomberg was elected mayor 12 years ago or have become rich while living here.
In 2001, 11,700 New Yorkers reported earning more than $1 million annually, according to summaries of resident tax returns provided by the mayor’s office. A decade later, 20,416 did.Continue reading the main story
Individuals are liable for local income taxes if they live in the city more than 180 days a year.
The number of poor people, as defined by the federal government, has also increased, to about 1.7 million in 2012, from about 1.6 million in 2000. Many poor people are stuck in low-wage jobs.
Mr. Bloomberg said that while the city had become a magnet for those with deep pockets, they had also helped ease the pain for those with fewer resources.
“We’ve been able to do something that none of these other cities can do, and that is attract a lot of the very wealthy from around the country and around the world,” Mr. Bloomberg said on his weekly radio show on Sept. 20.
“And they are the ones that pay a lot of the taxes, they’re the ones that spend a lot of money in the stores and restaurants and create a big chunk of our economy.
“And we take tax revenues from those people to help people throughout the entire rest of the spectrum. And you know, it gives you this income-inequality measure.”
Then, he added, “If we could get every billionaire around the world to move here it would be a godsend; that would create a much bigger income gap.”
Ronnie Lowenstein, director of the city’s Independent Budget Office, said the data bore out Mr. Bloomberg’s assertion about the growing numbers of affluent residents.
Wealthy residents are contributing to the city’s coffers, she said.
“And many of these people also contribute in very big way to libraries, museums and other things that make this not only a nice place to visit but a nice place to live.”
In 2011, New Yorkers who made more than $10 million annually accounted for nearly one-fifth of the city’s personal income tax revenue, which is second only to property taxes as a revenue source. The city also taxes capital gains like ordinary income instead of at lower rates as the federal government does.
Some 1,041 taxpayers reported making more than $10 million, and an additional 120 reported income over $50 million.
“Nearly 18 percent of all city personal income taxes were generated by this very small group of not even 1,200 taxpayers,” Ms. Lowenstein said. “That’s a huge contribution.”
Mr. Bloomberg’s comments about the income gap and the rich resonated on the campaign trail because Bill de Blasio, the Democratic mayoral candidate, has repeatedly portrayed New York as becoming two cities under Mr. Bloomberg’s stewardship.
But the Bloomberg administration has strongly defended its economic record.
“Other cities have much lower inequality levels,” Mr. Bloomberg’s press secretary, Marc LaVorgna, said, citing Detroit and Camden, N.J. “Are those better places for low-income families to live? Or would they be better off if they had more wealthy people, and a larger income gap, to provide a larger tax base to support a police department that keeps low income communities safe, funds good public schools and pays for a vast social services network like we do in New York City?
Mr. LaVorgna said that having more wealthy people did not make New York a worse place for poorer people.
“In fact, it makes it a better place and provides us with more ability to help those who are working their way up the economic ladder,” he said.
According to the city’s own more sophisticated measure, 46 percent of New Yorkers are living below 150 percent of the poverty line, which suggests that while they are not officially poor by the federal standard, they are struggling. Still, the poverty rate in New York is lower than in many other major cities.Continue reading the main story