New York’s business community has expressed deep concerns regarding the direction of the state and its financial outlook, but it does not appear businesses will be getting much relief anytime soon. As such, the most-recent iteration of the Siena College annual Upstate New York Business Leaders Survey indicates a grim outlook from CEOs trying to navigate New York’s rocky economic waters.

The survey’s results are startling. Of those asked, only 19 percent of upstate CEOs expect economic improvements in 2023. Further, just 23 percent of respondents reported an improvement in economic conditions from last year, and 54 percent of respondents said things have already worsened year over year. Inflation, which is still running hot at 6 percent, continues to wreak havoc on the business community, and three-quarters of those asked indicated they are having trouble filling open positions.

With the pandemic’s lockdowns and restrictions behind us, one would expect a much-greater sense of optimism about an economic rebound moving forward. Assembly Republicans repeatedly stated that the state’s businesses should not be forced to return to the oppressive climate that existed before the pandemic hit. Clearly, there’s much more work to be done.

 Overall, this survey paints a bleak picture; the economy is getting worse and there does not appear to be any end in sight. If you pair the survey results with the state’s shocking outmigration figures — the state lost more than 400,000 people in the past two years — it is clear something drastic needs to be done. Unfortunately, the one-party regime led by Gov. Kathy Hochul does not appear to be interested in addressing the root causes of these results. Making matters worse, if the governor had her way the upcoming budget would actively add fuel to the proverbial economic fire hampering the business community.

 The governor is proposing we spend $227 billion next year. The Assembly majority’s one-house budget proposes
$232.9 billion. Senate Democrats are hoping to spend $235.9 billion. To put those numbers in context, New York Democrats are calling for 50 percent more in spending than Florida’s proposed budget, yet New York has 2.5 million fewer people. Overweight, bloated budgets strain businesses and consumers alike, and when you consider the outmigration and survey results mentioned above it is fairly easy to put the pieces together. This approach does not work.

 Our Assembly minority conference has advocated for common-sense measures that reduce the tax burden on the business community, cut needless red tape and facilitate the hiring and training of desperately needed professional-skill workers. One need not look further than the business leader survey to see the value of these proposals. We have a responsibility to facilitate the success of the taxpayers living and working in New York, and I am calling on the governor and her legislative counterparts to take these survey results seriously. We have been on the wrong path for too long, and everyone knows it. Unless changes are made now, we will see similar, if not worse, results when Siena polls these business leaders next budget season.      

William (Will) A. Barclay, 54, Republican, is the New York Assembly minority leader and represents the 120th New York Assembly District, which encompasses all of Oswego County, as well as parts of Jefferson and Cayuga counties.

If you’ve been paying attention to national news, you know that one of the big topics preoccupying Washington is a debate over lifting the debt ceiling. So, for that matter, is overhauling Social Security.

 Many Democrats and Republicans alike are dug in on how, and under what conditions, Congress should act on these key issues. But make no mistake: It must act. Defaulting on the national debt in the name of deficit reduction or structural spending reform would be economically calamitous. And though there’s a little time on Social Security, it’s running out. The system will exhaust its reserves in about a decade, at which point recipients will face a sharp cut in benefits.

 Unforgiving issues like these throw into sharp relief one of the key realities in our democracy: Things don’t get resolved without compromise. It’s been a challenge of late, as the extremes in American politics have hardened and the very word “compromise” has come to be seen as an expletive in some circles. But really, it’s just simple arithmetic. To get anything done in Congress or a state legislature, you must get a majority of the votes — and often, that means you have to get votes from across the aisle.

This is not a bad thing. In fact, I’d argue it’s one of the virtues of our system, because it means that, on a regular basis, politicians have to consider what people who don’t agree with them think.

 This was baked into our system from the very beginning: The drafting of what became our Constitution was one long exercise in finding common ground and striking compromises. But as complex as that process was, in some respects the Founders had it easy: the process involved just a relative handful of people. These days, things have become infinitely more complicated, with a much larger, more diverse, more sophisticated, faster paced, wealthier, and vastly more politically organized country.

 That only makes the need for compromise more profound. In the end, a battle over public policy isn’t about momentary wins or losses, but about creating sustainable policy that’s accepted by a broad cross-section of the population. Because Americans display so many differences of opinion, developing a consensus that can command the support of a majority inevitably means crafting an approach that appeals to a diversity of people and viewpoints. In legislative terms, this means finding a path to bipartisan cooperation, because the one thing that’s certain is that public officials will leave office and any sustainable policy will have to appeal to their successors — or face the prospect of repeal.

As we’re almost certain to find out as the debt ceiling and Social Security debates move forward, the alternatives to compromise are pretty distasteful: economic hardship, perhaps, or the creation of a deeply disaffected minority. Compromise allows for progress: Even if nobody gets everything they want, everyone gets something they want.

 Because at the end of the day, the responsibility politicians bear is to make the country work — to provide political and economic stability and create an environment in which ordinary people can work freely and achieve their goals. They have to find a way to results that leave a large segment of the American people satisfied, and they need the bargaining room to craft those approaches. That’s one reason the maneuvering House Speaker Kevin McCarthy undertook with a tiny fraction of his caucus in order to win the gavel was so dispiriting: It locked him in to positions that the entire country may come to regret as Congress tackles tough issues that will demand compromise from the GOP House caucus. Legislators need room to work out their differences.

 Remember that as Congress moves ahead. We live in a gloriously complicated country, with lots of neighbors who hold strong opinions. We need results from our leaders that don’t produce chaos or conflict, but instead allow us to work peacefully and productively together. The only way to get there is through compromise.       

Lee Hamilton, 91, is a senior advisor for the Indiana University (IU) Center on Representative Government, distinguished scholar at the IU Hamilton Lugar School of Global and International Studies, and professor of practice at the IU O’Neill School of Public and Environmental Affairs. Hamilton, a Democrat, was a member of the U.S. House of Representatives for 34 years (1965-1999), representing a district in south-central Indiana.