10/24/2026
“Innocent people are already paying the price of City Hall perennially starving ambulance first responders of the salaries, benefits, and work conditions they deserve,” writes Errol Louis.
Over the last decade, response time on life-threatening medical emergencies has jumped by nearly four minutes, an increase of more than 41 percent, according to a recent report. Non-life-threatening response time has more than doubled, by almost 15 minutes. That extra time can be the difference between life and death.
The root of the problem is the absurdly low pay that New York’s frontline “street doctors” get. First-year emergency medical technicians (EMTs) make only $43,932, far lower than the entry-level salaries of firefighters ($54,122) and cops ($55,942), and less than first-year sanitation workers ($47,752). And while other uniformed personnel hit $100,000 within five and a half years, EMTs have smaller increases and top out at $68,700, with paramedics capped at $86,348.
“You have EMTs starting out at minimum wage, a little over $18 an hour,” says Vincent Variale, president of the Uniformed EMS Officers Union. “To live in New York City at that kind of salary, it’s very hard to do it. And that’s why people are leaving.”
“More and more EMTs and paramedics are leaving the job. We estimate by the time this is over, 1,500 will be gone,” continues Variale, noting that 500 EMS workers have left so far this year.
Louis writes about how emergency response times continue to rise as EMTs and paramedics are squeezed out of the workforce: https://nymag.visitlink.me/cAnCnl
