New York City Comptroller’s Office Releases Fiscal Year 2022 Popular Annual Financial Report

New York, NY — The Office of New York City Comptroller Brad Lander released today the Popular Annual Financial Report (PAFR) for Fiscal Year 2022. The report follows the October release of the Annual Comprehensive Financial Report (ACFR) for Fiscal Year 2022 which contained the City’s audited financial statements and detailed data on the City’s finances.

The PAFR serves as an accessible guide to the ACFR for residents and explains New York City government and finances in a concise and easy-to-understand manner. The PAFR is also enhanced with several explanatory visuals for readers.

This year, financial and statistical tables in the ACFR were available for download for the first time to increase transparency and accessibility. The City of New York was awarded the prestigious Certificate of Achievement for Excellence in Financial Reporting by the Government Finance Officers Association (GFOA) for the 42^nd consecutive year. This report will be submitted specifically for consideration of GFOA’s Award for Outstanding Achievement in Popular Annual Financial Reporting which the City of New York has received for the last seven fiscal years.

“As New York City continues a steady recovery from the economic impacts of the pandemic and looks to challenges ahead, New Yorkers deserve a transparent accounting of our City’s economy and finances. I am grateful to our Bureau of Accountancy for their work to provide a clear-eyed and comprehensive account of our City’s budget and finances. Transparency is essential to maintaining public trust, and especially when it comes to how taxpayer dollars are being spent,” said New York City Comptroller Brad Lander.

This year’s PAFR highlights:

New York City’s Economy

Employment Across New York City

• Private New York City employment fell from a pre-pandemic high of 4.1 million in February 2020, to almost 3.1 million in April, two months later.
• Despite employment’s recovery in the City, the end of the 2021/2022 fiscal year, private employment remained 182,000 below the pre-pandemic high.

Office Usage

• The pandemic has left a lasting impact on patterns of remote work and office use throughout the five boroughs that will remain a challenge for the City’s economy.
• An increase in social distancing and remote work has resulted in growing vacant office space since late 2020. Office rents have also trended down and remained depressed into 2022.

Housing and the Cost of Rent

• In early 2020, as New Yorkers relocated from the City and many lost their jobs, apartment vacancies spiked and rents fell. The number of available apartments began to fall late in 2020 and continued into 2022. Similarly, rents fell quickly through 2020, before bottoming out in 2021.
• As of early 2022, rents have surged to new highs and remain elevated as more workers moved from fully remote work schedules to hybrid work schedules.

Travel and Hotel Occupancy

• The arrival of the pandemic in the early months of 2020 drove monthly hotel room demand below one million, and room rates under $50 in April 2020.
• Demand rebounded as the pandemic waned, before taking a final dip with the Omicron wave of January 2021.
• Since early 2022, the resumption of travel has risen and has led to a steady increase in demand and revenue per available room.

The City of New York’s Finances

Primary Revenues

• In Fiscal Year 2022, program revenues were approximately $37.7 billion.
  • Education had the most program revenues, at $17.1 billion, followed by general government, at $8.7 billion, and social services, at $4.3 billion.
• Federal relief funding to address the immediate impacts of the pandemic on the education system has been a major component of program revenues.
• This consisted of funding under the Coronavirus Response and Relief Supplemental Appropriations (CRRSA) Act and the American Rescue Plan Act.

General Revenues

• In Fiscal Year 2022, general revenues were approximately $69.9 billion, an increase of $133 million from Fiscal Year 2021.
• Real estate taxes had the most revenues, totaling $29.5 billion, followed by personal income taxes at $15.5 billion.
• The increase of $2.5 billion in sales and use taxes was primarily driven by an increase in general sales due to relaxed business and travel restrictions as COVID-19 concerns subsided, allowing the economy to steadily return to normal activity.
• Additionally, this growth reflects improved local consumption and tourism over the low levels experienced in the prior year due to the economic restrictions related to COVID-19.

Expenses

• Fiscal Year 2022 expenses were approximately $97.4 billion, an increase of close to $2.6 billion from Fiscal Year 2021.
• Education, and public safety and judicial expenses were the largest shares of expenses respectively.

The full Popular Annual Financial Report for 2022 is available here.

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