Facing headwinds from the global markets, tax revenues are expected to grow, but not at the double-digit gains that occurred before the downturn, IBO says. With a subdued Wall Street, the report predicts that tax revenues will rise 4.3% to $41.4 billion this year and by an additional 5.5% to $43.6 billion in 2013.

Despite the softening, McCarthy says financial services is “still a vitally important industry in New York” that represents a third of all the office space users in the city, but a diversification of the economy is also helping to stabilize the market.

“If you look over the past 15 or 20 years, the growth in the city has been in professional services, in education and health, in leisure and hospitality,” he says. “During this recovery, the biggest sector for growth has been the professional services. It does speak to the fact that New York is not just a financial town any more. It is always going to be an important financial capital and it is always going to be important to New York, but we’ve diversified into many other industries, including technology.”

With Cornell and Technion University’s planned high-tech campus on Roosevelt Island, Google’s arrival at 111 Eighth Ave. and new incubator space sprouting up across the city, Mark Roberts, global head of research at RREEF Real Estate, tells GlobeSt.com that tech leasing will benefit New York in the long run.

“You also can’t overlook tourism and you can’t overlook foreign investment, so there are a lot of different sources of stability for New York,” he says. “Having said that, it is going to swing with the equity markets and what happens there. The regulations with the Volcker Rule are shifting those dynamics, to some degree. But in terms of global cities, New York is very affordable when you look at markets like London, Hong Kong and Tokyo.”