One of the many legacies of conservative Republicans of the past quarter-century has been the public's paranoia about tax increases.

You can't even raise the subject anymore. John McCain felt compelled to back off from his principled objection to the Bush tax cuts during this year's presidential election. Locally, Democrats have criticized County Exec Maggie Brooks for doing the right thing and letting property taxes rise with property values.

And so an obvious partial solution to the state's severe budget crisis - raising taxes - is considered outrageous.

Yes, New Yorkers are among the highest taxed people in the country. But some of us are in more pain than others. And it's dishonest to ignore a fact of New York's recent history: the state's income-tax system has become much less progressive.

The Fiscal Policy Institute, a progressive public-policy group, has compiled the evidence.

Since 1976, New York State has cut its top income-tax rate from the previous 15.375 percent down to 6.85 percent. That means, notes the Institute, that whether your family makes $41,000 a year or $1 million, your tax rate is the same. "The large multi-year tax cuts enacted between 1994 and 2005 are now reducing state revenue by over $17 billion per year," says the Institute.

And, says the Institute, the wealth disparity of New Yorkers has grown. From the 1980's to the mid-2000's, incomes of the bottom 20 percent of New Yorkers grew only 5.4 percent. Those of the middle 20 percent grew by only 8.3 percent. But the incomes of the top 20 percent grew 35.3 percent, and the top 5 percent grew 69.9 percent.

The state could raise billions of dollars if it simply raised the rate slightly for its wealthiest taxpayers.

Suggesting that we raise taxes on anybody brings howls from big business, and so far, Governor David Paterson has insisted that he won't even consider a tax hike. The talk is all about cuts.

Clearly, New York spends too much money on too many things, and legislators and the leaders of the special-interest communities do themselves no favor by refusing to talk about cuts. They look as out of touch as the automotive-industry executives who jetted to Washington on corporate planes last month to ask for taxpayer help.

The cuts ought to be fair, though, and it isn't fair - just as an example - to ignore the fact that urban school districts need more money than suburban districts.

The cuts also ought to protect the state's least fortunate. Traditionally, New Yorkers have believed that we have a responsibility to do that. And that responsibility will grow as more people slide toward poverty and charitable organizations themselves struggle in this economy.

We also need to recognize that many low-income people need help if they're to stay in the work force - and that costs money. Monroe County officials have tightened the eligibility level for subsidized day care. At County Legislators' request, the Brooks administration is now trying to find out whether the change has forced some parents to quit their jobs and go back on public assistance.

We can not cut our way out of this mess. The worst thing that could happen right now would be to deny crucial support and services to the New Yorkers who need it most.

There's plenty of work to be done in Albany. In a letter being circulated by the Fiscal Policy Institute, Columbia University professor and Nobel Economics Laureate Joseph Stiglitz urges an overhaul of the state's entire tax structure. Local governments have to rely too heavily on property taxes, says Stiglitz, because the state has pushed responsibilities like Medicaid onto them.

"The long-run solution," writes Stiglitz, "is to look more to the broad-based state personal income tax," with a graduated, more equitable tax system.

And raising the tax on the wealthiest New Yorkers, says Stiglitz, would be both fair and good for the state economically.