There aren't many new York startups that are aimed at solving the so called serious problems you mention. A large number of them are focused on online fashion s

There aren't many new York startups that are aimed at solving the so called serious problems you mention. A large number of them are focused on online fashion sales, with a mixed bag of other things. Foursquare is in NY, but it's mindset in terms of revenue appears to be no different than any company in the Valley. Tumblr hasn't really figured it out yet either. Hopefully this will change but as of now the various industries you are exposed to in NYC hasn't resulted in startups serving all of them. Otherwise you'd see a whole slew of financial startups but that hasn't been the case. The one that comes to mind at first is banksimple (or simple) which was trying to tackle a behemoth of an industry that needs change, but even they took off for Portland. Sometimes a revolution comes from the outside.