New York, take it from London: Defend your film tax credit

Benefits could spread across the state, as they have in the U.K.

(Image caption: Emily Blunt’s new movie A Quiet Place was shot in the the Mohawk Valley. Photo credit: Youtube trailer for A Quiet Place.)

For millions of foreign visitors every year, New York is the movies.

From yellow cabs to skyscrapers and the subway, movies have seared the cityscape into the world’s popular imagination. Ever since King Kong went on a rampage across the Big Apple, the city’s movie glamour has powered its tourist industry.

Movies make a huge, direct contribution to the Empire State’s economy too. Last year, movie and TV production in the state generated $3.8 billion and created 227,561 jobs.

But such success is subsidized by New Yorkers’ tax dollars. Movie and TV producers get checks from the state for 30% of their production and postproduction costs. At $420 million a year, it is the most generous such program in the nation.

That’s too much, some Republican state senators say. Led by Sen. Robert Ortt of Niagara County, they’re calling for the measures to be scrapped.

Click here to read the rest of the article on Crain’s New York Business site.