Why is upstate ny so poor

Moreover, the upstate region is laggard within New York as a whole: with tourism and the stock market surging, the New York metro area and Long Island reported twice upstate's job-growth rate for the first half of this year. Only one upstate area—Poughkeepsie—exceeds the national 2.

Six upstate cities—Buffalo, Elmira, Newburgh, Syracuse, Rochester, and Utica—are so hard up for job growth that they'd actually receive federal aid under the Clinton administration's proposed "New Markets Initiative" to bring enterprise to devastated areas like Appalachia and inner-city Los Angeles. To qualify, a census tract must show a poverty rate of 25 percent or higher, or have wage levels of less than 80 percent of the national average.

G iven this weak performance, it's not surprising that upstate's population is shrinking. Last year, upstate lost more population than any state did, with 0. Metro Buffalo has lost 36, people during the nineties; Utica is down 22, Worse, it is the young who are going.

During the past decade, Oneida County lost Needless to say, upstate is having a hard time attracting new people. As Anthony Kumiega, staffing and employment manager at defense contractor Lockheed-Martin's Syracuse operation, glumly puts it: "When mobile people think of going somewhere, New York isn't even on their list.

We seem to have the reputation for people leaving rather than people coming. The loss of the young and ambitious, combined with the failure of the region to attract talent from other states, may itself be limiting job growth, especially in knowledge-based sectors like high tech.

Though Kodak, Rochester's biggest employer, is mired in economic difficulties, it is still desperate for highly skilled engineers, says company spokesman Paul Allen. But it can't find any in the area. In Syracuse, the high-skilled manpower shortage is so bad that a group of high-tech companies have banded together to form "the DaVinci Project," a website touting the benefits of life and work in upstate New York.

A shrinking population has spelled trouble for upstate homeowners, too. Other upstate metro areas have seen small increases in the worth of homes: in Albany, a negligible 0. Collapsing demand has hurt homebuilders: "I can't make money here anymore," grumbles Robert Deforest, who runs his business out of Syracuse.

Earlier in the decade, he built 30 homes a year upstate; now he builds ten. It adds up to some bleak scenes in a region that, from Niagara Falls to the Catskills, teems with natural beauty. Much of the Lake Erie waterfront south of Buffalo consists of derelict buildings and empty lots. In Rochester, the streets around Kodak Park appear hauntingly deserted in the wake of the corporation's thousands of job cuts.

All over upstate, you can't help feeling that things are falling apart and shriveling up. Accordingly, Michael Margolis's New Buffalo Graphics, a store championing Buffalo's supposed comeback and selling T-shirts promoting the city, closed its doors in W hy does upstate sag while the rest of the rust belt thrives?

A small part of the answer is bad luck. As the eighties' painful industrial restructuring revolutionized the rust belt, upstate New York found itself with plants owned by companies, such as Bethlehem Steel, that couldn't adapt and eventually perished.

But the deeper reason has to do not with luck, but with politics. During the late eighties and nineties, the rust belt benefited hugely from a group of governors who cut taxes, restrained spending, and promoted smart development policies, helping to transform previously high-cost states into investment-attracting and business-nourishing places. Ohio's governor for most of the nineties, Republican George Voinovich, cut the state's rate of spending growth to its lowest level in 30 years and kept Ohio's taxes well below the national average, for example; he also aggressively lobbied to attract foreign businesses, so that Ohio now leads the nation in luring overseas investment.

In neighboring Indiana, Democrat Evan Bayh spent eight years in office without once raising taxes. In Illinois, Republican Jim Edgar used his eight-year term to slash the state government's workforce and left office this year with a gigantic budget surplus. When Thompson first came into office in , he pushed through his state legislature the largest capital-gains tax break in the country—the main reason corporate taxes were 20 percent lower than in New York by Thompson has also gone out of his way to make sure that growing companies are happy.

Both he and Thompson have had to cajole, persuade, or threaten recalcitrant state legislators to pass reforms. At one point, Engler's popularity polls had dropped to 19 percent, as critics charged him with being "mean-spirited"; today, his approval ratings are above 60 percent. Smart political leadership wasn't the only reason the rust belt came back—it also benefited from some eagle-eyed corporations and energetic business groups. But its political climate is the major difference with its sick sibling, upstate New York.

U pstate New York has long been utterly toxic to business, thanks to high taxes, extensive regulation, and excessive energy costs—all products of New York's uniquely dysfunctional political culture, which, five years into George Pataki's governorship, remains thoroughly entrenched.

How New York came to be a tax-burdened basket case is a well-known story, centering on two profligate governors. Beginning in the late fifties and for nearly two decades thereafter, Nelson Rockefeller transformed New York into a state-capitalist behemoth that furiously set to building public universities, state hospitals, and public housing projects, and to launching countless government programs, including a massive expansion of Medicaid.

Mario Cuomo, first elected in the recession year , spent the 12 years of his administration extending the reach of state government even further, firm in his belief that New York was a "family" that had to take care of its own.

Pataki was going to rescue New York from all this fiscal intemperance, but he hasn't. Per-capita state and local taxes were But upstate's profusion of Appalachia-poor residents, who pay taxes at low rates, help keep the percentage down. New York's property taxes are nearly 70 percent higher than the average state. One key reason: New York forces localities to pay 50 percent of the non-federal share of Medicaid—a share that zoomed percent higher than the U.

The 50 poorest places in Upstate NY are ranked below, with 1 being the community with the lowest median household income in the region. For this year's ranking, we've also included the median income for family and non-family households in each area to compare. These incomes were not factored into the ranking. We've also included the ranking from the previous year , so you can see which places are moving up and down the list.

Total households: Previous rank: unranked. Total households: , Lawrence County. Total households: 1, Total households: 21, Previous rank: Total households: 23, Previous rank: 5. Total households: 10, Regis Falls, place Franklin County.

You stay in your house most of the summer because you aren't used to the heat 7. You drive at 55 mph through 10 feet of snow during a raging blizzard without flinching You carry jumper cables in your car and your girlfriend knows how to use them Driving is better in the winter because the potholes are filled in with snow You know 4 seasons : almost winter, winter, cold, construction Cows are just part of the scenery You know that the phrase, "Goin up ta," applies to going north, south, east, or west, up or down in elevation, and pretty much any other way you can travel.

The smell of freshly spread cow manure doesn't bother you. Halloween costumes are always designed around a snowsuit and winter boots. You can name everyone you graduated with.

You still go home for Homecoming. Your teachers call you by your older sibling's name. You have to name six surrounding towns to explain to people where you're from. When somebody says "Thats billy fucillo HUGE " you know exactly what they are talking about I don't agree with the people saying upstate starts just noth of NYC and Long Island, It is more the Finger Lakes and north regions, maybe some of the southern tier but I am pretty sure they have their own set of rules there.

Upstate New Yorker: Oh wow, look we got over two feet of snow last night! Good thing I have four wheel drive! Mom, we have a snow day right? Snow like this is dangerous! Upstate New Yorker: I'm from Phelps , um half way between rochester and syracuse, near geneva and canandaguia, kind by waterloo? The use of this term varies by region. However, for NYC they probably have never left their borough, or for LI they're jealous because Westchester is essentially a superior version of Nassau County.

Person from Jericho: " ? So you're from Upstate? I'm closer to Manhattan than you are. Everyone knows that Upstate New York begins above Westchester.