New: MTA Spending County-by-County 2014-2023

From 2014 to 2023 the MTA spent $30 billion purchasing goods and services from businesses in New York State. This analysis provides a breakdown of MTA spending by county and is a companion to Reinvent Albany’s interactive webpage showing MTA spending by 2025 legislative district. 

The MTA service area includes 12 counties in New York State: the five boroughs of New York City (Bronx, Kings, New York, Queens, and Richmond counties) and the seven surrounding counties (Nassau, Suffolk, Westchester, Orange, Rockland, Dutchess, and Putnam). By law, these counties also make up the Metropolitan Commuter Transportation District for tax purposes. “Zone 1” refers to New York City’s five boroughs, and “Zone 2” refers to the seven surrounding counties. 

Reinvent Albany believes that it would be a huge mistake for the New York State Legislature to exempt any of the counties in the MTA service area from the MTA Commuter Transportation District. Not only do these counties receive the benefit of MTA transit service, they also directly benefit from MTA spending on local companies. New York City based businesses and taxpayers already pay 71% of the taxes that support the MTA, which provides enormous economic benefits to all of Downstate and the state as a whole. 

The twelve counties in the MTA Commuter Transportation District all benefit from large MTA spending. In fact, some suburban Zone 2 counties received more MTA payments than Zone 1, including Westchester, Suffolk, Rockland, and Nassau counties over the last 10 years. In total, NYS companies received $30 billion of MTA payments over the last 10 years. See below a list of New York State counties receiving MTA payments.

Click here to view the MTA Spending in NYS Counties 2014-2023 dataset

Eleven Counties Did No Business With the MTA

The counties of Allegany, Essex, Genesee, Hamilton, Herkimer, Lewis, Otsego, Schuyler, Seneca, Warren and Wyoming received no MTA payments from 2014-2023. 

Zone 1, New York City, Pays Higher Payroll Taxes than Suburban Zone 2

There are currently different tax rates assessed based on Zone for the metropolitan commuter transportation mobility tax (“MCTMT”, also known as the Payroll Mobility tax or “PMT”). The Legislature and Governor approved an increase in the PMT for New York City alone in 2023, resulting in a higher rate of taxes for NYC employers compared to suburban employers. Currently, Zone 1 employers pay a .6% rate for payroll expenses over $437,500, compared to .34% for Zone 2, as shown in the tables below (see also the NYS Department of Taxation and Finance website).

A list of the top 10 vendors in the twelve MTA Commuter District counties from 2014-2023 is provided below (alphabetical by county).

Green = Zone 1

Blue = Zone 2

Bronx – $382 million (Zone 1)

Dutchess – $50 million (Zone 2)

Kings – $2 billion (Zone 1)

Nassau – $3.9 billion (Zone 2)

New York – $6.6 billion (Zone 1)

Orange – $66 million (Zone 2)

Putnam – $35 million (Zone 2)

Queens – $7 billion (Zone 1)

Richmond – $560 million (Zone 1)

Rockland – $763 million (Zone 2)

Suffolk – $2.3 billion (Zone 2)

Westchester – $4.6 billion (Zone 2)