The AG's price gouging will drive business from New York.

0:00 Speaker 1 What is today is Paul Zuba. He represents the business people the Business Council of New York State, and we had a discussion the other day where I was talking about we lost four hundred and eighty four thousand consumers in New York State in the last twenty four months, and he is concerned that we’re going to start losing businesses. Besides,

0:26 Paul Zuba, welcome to the Catch round table.

0:29 Speaker 2 Well, thank you, thank you for having me and having the opportunity to kind of talk to you about, you know, some of the concerns that we have at the Business Council. As you said, John, we represent over three thousand businesses.

0:43 We represent small businesses all the way up to major companies, so we get the full kind of understanding of the market from small to big, every sector of the market. And you know, there’s a lot of concern in the business community about you know, what’s going on in Aubany and some of the things that we believe folks are

1:05 missing that would help business and help business grow and keep people in New York State.

1:09 Speaker 1 Well, I’m very much concerned because I know the budget is being done this weekend and I don’t know the final results yet. And my only advice to Aubany was and all segments in Albany, is that everybody wants to raise taxes, everybody wants to raise the budget and give more benefits, et cetera, et cetera. But who’s going to

1:33 be around to pay it?

1:36 Speaker 2 I look, I totally agree. And you know, there’s some there’s some really simple things that the legislature that could do that could you know, help businesses, help create jobs. You know, businesses are still paying for COVID sick pay leave.

1:50 I mean they’re still paying for COVID paid sick paid leave. We have a we have a not for profit in Western New York. It’s cost them over a million dollars to pay for COVID paid sickly. Last time I checked, the President had issued a statement that May eighth, I believe is going to be what they consider the end

2:12 of COVID. Why do we still have Why is nobody talking about you know, changing as well? We do have paid family sickly. There’s no reasons costing our businesses more money. And there’s so many more. There’s unemployment insurance. You know, businesses are being hit with additional taxes. Do no fault of their own because during the pandemic they had to

2:34 close their business, and instead of doing what most states did, which is refund the Unemployment Insurance Fund, New York decided to spend the money on something else. So now our businesses are being hit with taxes that they had no it was nothing that they did. They were just following mandates that the state placed on them during the COVID period,

2:59 restricting employees because they were non essential places of business. So these are the type of things that hurt our businesses. It frustrates people, It makes New York on a affordable These are the frustrating things that we keep seeing. Paul.

3:18 Speaker 1 We are on the brink of losing our city in our state because if four hundred and eighty four thousand people have moved, those are the ones that pay a lot of the taxes. And now if we’re going to go after businesses too, and I don’t know what’s going to happen. You know, one of my main businesses is

3:38 real estate, and we have the ability. We spent several billion dollars in the last five years building beautiful buildings and we have the ability to build more. But Paul, you know what I’m doing. We’re building. We’re building in Florida right now, because I don’t know when I’m gonna inspect spend the next billion? Should I spend the next

3:59 big in in New York? WHI should I spend the next billion in Florida? You know, my kids tell me Florida Dad, Florida Dad.

4:09 Speaker 2 Well, you know what it’s It’s it’s a reality, John. And it seems as though nobody wants to understand that that’s the reality that people are literally leaving our state believing it because it’s unaffordable. But it’s unaffordable to me because nobody is sitting and talking to business and saying, hey, guys, how do we how do we make this work? How

4:35 do we make this more more affordable? Somehow business has become the bad guy, and we’re not the bad guy. Businesses want to grow, they want to grow their employees, they want to have a diverse group of employees. But you know, no one’s sitting down and talking to business about how to make this work. And you know, you

4:54 see it. I see it, And there’s article after article. There was recent article in the Times about how African americ parks are leaving New York State. They’re moving to places like Atlanta, Georgia. Why because it’s more affordable. You know, it’s not because of the minimum wage, because the minimum wage is seven dollars and twenty five cents in Georgia.

5:13 They’re leaving because it’s unaffordable. And until folks start working with business and help and working hand in hand, we’re going to have people continue to leave.

5:26 Speaker 1 Well, you know, businesses are under attack in many many ways workmen’s compensation, insurance, unemployment insurance, et cetera, et cetera. And you know, you don’t know as a businessman, I don’t know if the zig zag. And you know, I’m getting old. I’m over seventy, and you know, I want to leave my kids in charge, but I don’t want

5:49 them leave them in charge where they’re in combat every day.

5:53 Speaker 2 It is combat every day. And look, I think that there are a lot of really good, wonderful, hard working legislators. So I don’t mean this to be, you know, an attack solely on the legislature, but there is a group of legislators who have only one thing on their mind.

6:14 It’s it’s like attack business, attack business, attack business, attack business, as if business is the culprit right, And then you know, what people have to understand is the world’s changed since COVID, right, you know, we you know, and I’ve been around long enough.

6:31 You used to go to the office all the time. That was that was how you did business. You don’t need to do that anymore. You can zoom, you can do different things. And when you’re telling business that they’re not welcome, then it’s very easy for them to go someplace else. And that’s a problem.

6:44 Speaker 1 Yes, they can go to North Carolina, they can go to Tennessee, which is down down the block from US, as you can say, and they can fly into New York two days a week and do their business if they have to, exactly.

6:59 Speaker 2 And that’s that’s what a lot of and that’s what a lot of people are doing. It’s a migration, it’s a migration out and it becomes very easy. And people have to understand that whole that whole dynamic that happened during COVID is changing the world and we have to keep up with this change. We have to make this

7:18 a place that people want to live and do business.

7:22 Speaker 1 We’ve got to make a friendly place. You know, I’m telling Governor Hoko that I’m coming. I’m telling uh, the Attorney General tis James at Hasty, who’s a very nice guy. I know him. For the State Assembly. I’m telling me, uh, Mike Gannaris, who helps run who I know very well.

7:44 I went to his wedding on the State Senate. I don’t know Stuart Cousins at all, but I’m telling them all, I don’t want to lose our city. I don’t want to lose our state. And I’m telling you, I’m crying.

7:57 I got an extra box of Kleenex for city in our state. I mean, I’m gonna survive. I’m gonna survive, but you know, and I don’t want to leave New York.

8:07 Speaker 2 I’m right there with you. I don’t want to leave New York. I love New York. But it’s getting harder and harder to be in New York. You know again, like you hit the nail on the head, something as simple as unemployment insurance. Yes, I mean, how can we not fix that? Thirty five states have fixed the unemployment insurances.

8:30 That again, that is not It’d be one thing if it was business’s fault for you know, the unemployment insurance, but it wasn’t. They did what they were told to do by the state government. Shut down your business because you’re a non essential business. They shut down their business, people had to go get unemployment. It wasn’t their fault.

8:50 Now they’re getting stuck with the bill, and that’s not fair. That’s something that makes people not want to do business or open businesses in New York.

8:59 Speaker 1 One. Let’s stop the bleeding. Let’s tell all our senior people that run our city, in our state, let’s stop the bleeding, and then let’s figure out how we bring the people back.

9:14 Speaker 2 Absolutely absolutely, And I think, you know, John, I think one of the issues that I’ve kind of noticed over the years. And again, you know, you you named some people who I think are wonderful people. Carl Hasty is one of the one of the best legislators I know.

9:30 I do know Andrew Stewart cousin, she’s wonderful. Tiss James, but we all needed.

9:35 Speaker 1 I love them, I believe I love Tis James, I love Governor Hoko, but we love them all. But but you know, I went to Mike Janaris’s wedding. I love Hasty. He’s a Star Trek fan, and me and him had a good discussion on it. But we got to bring all.

9:52 We got to stop the bleeding and bring to.

9:54 Speaker 2 People got up and we gotta be willing to sit down and talk to everybody and the minds in a room who know and can tell people what is going on. You know, one of the things real quick. And I know we got some other issues that I want to talk about. But you know, we have a gentleman in

10:13 our office who is our human resource director. He gets about three hundred people on a webinar every month, small businesses who are there strictly to understand what the heck the state had just has just done to them in terms of mandates. Because the small businesses don’t know, they don’t have human resource departments, but all they know is

10:35 they get getting hit with mandate after mandate after mandate after mandate and again, if you’re not going to make it business friendly, people aren’t going to open businesses. That means people aren’t going to get jobs. That means people are going to leave the state. And that’s what we’re fighting for at the Business Counsel.

10:52 Speaker 1 Paul Zuber, Business Council, New York State, New York City, thank you so much for coming on and I pray for us. Pray for our state and we’ll talk again real soon.

11:03 Speaker 2 All right, Thank you John, and have a great day. Thank you.