Sorry, but under state law, all pension, social security and 401K income is exempt from state and local income taxes at any age for former public employees, but only at age 65 or later for those retiring from the private sector.

(Cheer up, Larry. The airlines wiggled out of their pension obligations. That means if things get bad enough, there's a precedent.)

The airlines got out through a formal process, but politicians do things sleazy. One possibility -- you got a pension? Then it is offset against Social Security, with the federal government using the savings for aid to help local governments provide SOMETHING.

Or take Medicare. They are proposing to cut the pay of physicians under the program. Keep doing that, and fewer will accept Medicare, so even with all the same benefits and more still on the books, the actual health care will be unavailable.

Legally, the health care industry must take Medicare for full payment, but they have to make a living. So health care will be allocated by payments under the table, meaning that only those with enough money to make those payments would be able to get the benefit of PUBLIC health care funding.

Just like the better off have been able to access the few public schools actually providing an education here in the past few decades.

The lost pensions and health care, of course, will fall not on those who took too much out but on younger generations who were forced to put more in. Gee, that brief era when the government actually redistributed income down was good one, wasn't it? No back to 5,000 years of human history.

Cheer up, Larry. The airlines wiggled out of their pension obligations. That means if things get bad enough, there's a precedent.

In a way. The "free" 2000 pension enhancement (and not paying enough in during the 1990s) ran the city's retirement cost to the moon, and that's how they paid for it. Bloomberg blames an aribitrator, but he had already cut a deal to cut the pay for new hires by 15% at DC 37.

But no, the new teacher deal is the poster child.

In other cases, the pensions and other benefits for those leaving are enhanced at the peak of a boom, purportedly for nothing. And the new hires then get screwed in a bust, due to "circumnstances beyond our control." This way the two are never linked together, because people forget.

This deal included the ripoff for new hires and the massive handover to those 55 in the same package, right on the edge of a fiscal crisis. The only dispute is if the worse deal for the new teachers pays for it all (their view) or if the amount of funding for the classroom otherwise will have to be cut as well (my view, because they didn't even include the cost of retiree healthcare).

But of course the guys who stick it out can retire in 20 with 1/2, as they say, mostly tax-free.

Well, paying people more to not work, and less to work, is hardly a way to get quality public services. And upping the deal for those leaving and paying less to those coming isn't a way to get quality services in the future.

At least he isn't being paid $25K, like the newly-hired police. And, if he has enough years in to be in favor of the pension deal, he almost certainly is paid more than I am, and I am paid more than the majority of people in the city (though less than the majority of those driving to the CBD).

Don't you know, "Old Man Wanna Be Rich, Rich Man Wanna Be King," and all that.

Nope, the ongoing cycle of pension enhancements for those cashing in and moving out, offset by lower pay and benefits for new hires, in government (and in some other unionized industries) drives me crazy. Just part of the ongoing generational war.

The most recent example was the deal allowing NYC teachers to retire at 55 instead of 62, with current teachers who qualify allowed to walk out the door immediately without contributing an extra dime, but future teachers forced to pay far more into the pension ever after to partially offset the cost. That and budget cuts in the schools.

Didn't hear about it? It passed in January. They don't issue press releases for these things.

Rhubarbpie has a very, very good point: You guys should be thrilled that in this particular situation Shelly holds all this singular and concentrated power, because if it wasn't that way CP would have ZERO chance in the Assembly. The only reason it's even breathing now is because Shelly's still officially on the fence. So maybe, just maybe, evil old Shelly is saving you from the elected dolts he presides over.

BTW, where the heck is the Post story about Christine Quinn's slushy funds, illegally un-allocated and held in the name of non-existant organizations? Now we know where much of that scrumptious pork came from to feed the council trolls who jumped the fence last week.

So be it. But when the fare goes up and transit service starts to deteriorate, those who voted no would be blamed.

That is why everything is 212 to 0, and most things are never voted on at all.

What the Democratic members in the Assembly will have to get their heads around is that as a result of all the favors, deals and debts in all those budgets they have voted yes on and not read, they will be voting to raise taxes, raise fees, and cut services for years to come. The alternative is bankruptcy, and they may come.

The first people you need to persuade of the folly of this idea (and the wisdom of yours, to restore it to true waterfront PARKway)are those at Transportation Alternatives, who have the misguided idea that expanding truck capacity is the way to solve truck congestion, and at the expense of parks and greenways no less.

Interesting. Can someone from Transportation Alternatives confirm or deny that this is a general principle you subscribe to?

Regardless of whether they have that principle, T.A. has long supported tearing down the Sheridan Expressway, and whatever value that highway has is mostly as a truck route. I would expect them to support tearing down the Belt Parkway or returning it to parkway standards.

Beyond that, I've said this many times: While the speaker is obviously largely in control of his delegation, his positions are in fact deeply affected by the Democratic members in the Assembly, and to pretend otherwise neglects history, the way politics works, and human nature.

That's because on everything that matters, the vote in Albany is 212 to 0, with most people living here today and everyone living here in the future represented by the zero. So in other words, the assumption is his is the only vote that matters.

On option he has is to release CP for an open debate and an open vote. But that is anathema in Albany.

While the millionaire tax is off the table for now, I'd be very interested in seeing if the mayor could change his tune on this (leading along the governor and his friends in the senate) to engage in the kind of give-and-take that will make it easier to pass congestion pricing.

He represents what has got to be one of the most environmentally active constituencies in the country...just to further that point, I just got an e-mail from an acquaintance in the neighborhood urging me (and 20 others on the list) to call his office in support of congestion pricing. This guy will be surprised by the pressure, and I bet will change his view if we work on him enough.