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Dear NYC Voters

GrandpaPublius
@GrandpaPublius
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Dear NYC voters,

I hear you are about to elect a mayor who is promising to make your city more affordable.

Has it occurred to you to ask why only this candidate is promising to make the city more affordable? You have a mayoral election every four years: do you remember any other candidate in your lifetime promising to make the city more affordable?

I have an explanation. It is not possible for any mayor to lower prices on anything. Mr. Mamdani is different from the other mayoral candidates only in that he is more willing to lie to you.

As a socialist, Mamdani would like to make NYC less affordable for the rich and more affordable for the poor by imposing extra taxes on the rich and using the money to give the poor free stuff. Unfortunately, the rich are not captives. They can move. They can move short to Connecticut or Jersey, or they can move long to Miami. When they move, they take their money with them. Your governor knows this. She will not let your new mayor raise taxes on the rich.

As for new, better and improved rent control, Mamdani is not the first. Many cities have a long history of trying to lower housing costs with rent control. The findings are unanimous. It doesn’t work.

Here is the good news. Mamdani will not do most of what he is promising to do, just like de Blasio did not do most of what he promised to do. This is good news because anything Mamdani actually does do is likely to make things worse instead of better.

So, good luck, New York. You won’t like the next four years, but you will survive them. You are not captives either, you know. Over three hundred million Americans find happiness outside NYC. We like to visit, but we don’t want to live there. And, the place we live is more affordable.

G-Pub

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Discussion (15)

  • Full Size Tabby@FullSizeTabby
    GrandpaPublius (View Post):

    Unfortunately, the rich are not captives. They can move. They can move short to Connecticut or Jersey, or they can move long to Miami. When they move, they take their money with them. Your governor knows this.

    Earlier that was also something even Andrew Cuomo talked about when he was governor (when he wasn't telling people who disagreed with him on social policy they were not welcome in the state). New York's tax revenue (both city and state) was already then heavily dependent on a very small number of high income people (25,000 or so people in a city of 8 million and a state of 19 million). Even Mr. Cuomo recognized that rich people have options (they can move), and it wouldn't take many of those few high income people moving out to put a significant dent in both city and state tax revenues.

  • Eb Snider@EbSnider

    And from the voter stats I've seen many of his supporters are NOT generational or long time New Yorkers. I also don't think many of his supporters know or care about the historical lessons learned you mentioned or are generally present in American traditional society.

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