I think they based Tony's income streams on the Genovese and Lucchese Jersey factions, not to mention the war with Phil, which had Amuso's "Operation Wack Jersey" written all over it. And how did the trouble begin with NY? Tony "holding out earnings". The DeCavalcantes hadn't been this relevant since probably the 1960s.

I think the best way to make sense of this show is to view Tony's family as a Jersey crew of a NY family. And I think they give enough of a clue with old man Carmine's line about the Sopranos being a "glorified crew", not a family.

Season 1 however had a lot of similarities to the DeCavalcante conflicts in the 1990s. Boss in prison, acting boss dying of cancer, power struggle to replace him, etc. Those DeCav guys on wiretap talking about the show noticed it too.

That's why I loved seasons 1 and 2. They were so Jersey. Starting with season 3 there were more and more references to NY, shots of the Manhattan skyline, etc.

Regarding Mike Tacetta, there was an article around the time the show premiered with cops chiming in on who they thought the Sopranos characters were based on, and one of them said Tecatta was the only guy in recent memory running around Jersey with Tony's kind of swagger.

"...the successful annihilation of organized crime's subculture in America would rock the 'legitimate' world's foundation, which would ultimately force fundamental social changes and redistributions of wealth and power in this country. Meyer Lansky's dream was to bond the two worlds together so that one could not survive without the other." - Dan E. Moldea