Mr. Cuomo's budget deal also raises the business franchise tax to 7.25%, from 6.5%. This affects many independent proprietors and will be another incentive to escape from Manhattan. Both of these tax increases are sold as temporary "surcharges," running through 2027 for the income tax and 2023 for the corporate tax. But politicians in Albany used the same line when they passed the "millionaires tax" in 2009. Does Mr. Cuomo think two decades is temporary? The reason for the tax increase isn't the pandemic or a revenue shortfall. Mr. Cuomo last year pointed a gun at New York's head and threatened to shoot unless Congress sent more money. He received the ransom he demanded, and more. The state is getting $12.6 billion in direct budget relief from President Biden's $1.9 trillion Covid bill. Mr. Cuomo said those funds will "help offset devastating revenue losses caused entirely by the pandemic." Yet state revenues even before federal aid are running a mere 0.1% ($47 million) lower than during the last fiscal year (April-February). This tiny gap is nothing next to the more than $50 billion of federal relief New York has received for schools, Medicaid, transit and general budget aid since March 2020. The problem is that Albany wants to shovel out money faster than Washington will backfill, and progressives want to punish high earners for their sin of success. New York's operating fund spending this year will increase $7 billion, to a total of $111 billion. The state's overall budget is up $18 billion. Schools will get an extra $3 billion in state funds, an 11.3% increase over last year, and that's on top of $13 billion in federal aid, which they can spend over multiple years. Most of this will inevitably flow into higher teacher salaries. The new budget includes a huge welfare expansion, with $2.1 billion in cash payments mostly for lower-income undocumented immigrants. It includes $1 billion in reparations for businesses hurt by the Governor's excessive lockdowns. That's on top of $750 million in "economic development" for "impacted industries." Most of this will flow to the politically favored. Speaking of which, Mr. Cuomo brags that the budget will spur $29 billion in private and public "investment" for 12,400 megawatts of green energy, including two wind farms off Long Island and a 250-mile "transmission superhighway" to take green power to "the parts of the state that still rely on polluting fossil-fuel plants," i.e., New York City.