New York is at a turning point — and state and local lawmakers are on the brink of making the wrong call.
Business leaders across the state are sounding the alarm: we rank near the bottom nationally in business friendliness, taxation, and migration. And yet, lawmakers are considering new tax increases that would make it more difficult for small businesses to survive and grow. As the owner of a single-location small business, I can tell you plainly: this is the wrong direction for working New Yorkers.
I believe in paying my fair share, but there is a difference between smart investment in shared priorities and piling new costs onto the small businesses that are already struggling.
The biggest challenge we face isn’t just cost — it’s uncertainty. Capital flows where certainty exists. Too many small business owners in New York feel the rules are constantly shifting. When new tax burdens, mandates, and compliance requirements can appear without warning or a clear rationale, investment slows, expansion stalls, and in some cases, businesses simply don’t make it.
We talk a lot about workforce development, wages, and economic opportunity. But if we don’t create an environment where businesses can start, invest, and provide livable wages, you can’t have a strong, growing, and worker-centric economy.
Right now, New York is making that harder than it needs to be and two proposed tax hikes would make it harder still — including a property tax hike for New York City homeowners and a so-called “mansion tax” that is so broad it would increase rent on residential and small business tenants.
New costs are exacerbated by regulatory complexity. It’s not just the number of rules — it’s how difficult they are to navigate. As a business owner, every dollar I spend navigating agency bureaucracy, layers of approvals, and processes that are anything but straightforward, is a dollar I’m not investing in my operations or employees.
Unlike large corporations, small businesses often don’t have multiple locations to spread costs across, compliance departments, or endless capital reserves. We operate on tight margins, and every inefficiency hits us harder.
Access to capital is another critical piece of the puzzle. I’ve personally benefited from a public-private financing program tied to the JFK Airport redevelopment that provided opportunities to small businesses like mine that we would never have had otherwise. This kind of smart, targeted investment — blending public and private capital to reduce costs and open doors — is exactly the model we need to break down barriers and create opportunity.
Starting a business in New York today is so difficult that, when someone tells me they want to do it, my first instinct is to warn them how hard it will be. That shouldn’t be the case. We should be encouraging entrepreneurship, because it is increasingly becoming the path to the middle class.
None of this means abandoning smart regulation or important protections. It means being intentional and asking: does this rule help or hinder economic growth? Does it make it easier or harder for a small business to operate?
To her credit, Gov. Hochul understands this. Her “Let Them Build” agenda and the new EXPRESS NY initiative — which specifically targets burdensome requirements that make it harder for small businesses to launch and grow — are steps in the right direction. The Legislature should take note, and apply this same logic to tax proposals it’s currently reviewing.
The path forward is clear. Reject the tax hikes. Reduce unnecessary red tape. Streamline processes. Improve access to capital. And most importantly, send a clear message to small businesses: we’ve got your back.
Gordon is the owner of historic Neir’s Tavern in Woodhaven, Queens.