"I have a dream", proclaimed Martin Luther King Jr. all those years ago. The 34-year-old Democratic socialist Zohran Kwame Mamdani, elected the new mayor of New York, also has a dream. This is what infuses his arrival as the first Muslim and South Asian to lead the largest and richest city in America with so much excitement and hope.
It might bear noting that the population of New York City exceeds that of several US states. Its GDP of $1.8 trillion is about 40% the size of India's. In fact, if it were a country, the Big Apple's GDP would rank about 16th in the world.
Such is the city that Mamdani addressed in his victory speech in Brooklyn, while promising that "We'll fight for you because we are you. The future is in our hands."
A few miles from the green gaze of the Statue of Liberty, an icon of America, and of Ellis Island, he said, "New York will remain a city of immigrants. A city built by immigrants, powered by immigrants, and as of tonight, led by an immigrant. We'll love everyone, whether you are an immigrant or not."
He promised real delivery. "Our greatness will be anything but abstract."
It was an elevating moment.
A disclosure. I met Mamdani briefly some years ago, when he was running for the state legislature—his first electoral office. He was just starting out, and it didn't take too long for me to be impressed.
Mamdani didn't overwhelm me with his presence. But he did not seem like a regular politician. His passion for making the world fairer seemed sincere.
A guy who puts his body on the line, he soon went on a hunger strike to support taxi drivers, who faced crushing debt over city-issued medallion permits, priced in the millions. He was rather funny and in touch with his roots—his campaign buttons then said Roti and Roses. From that day, he became one of the only electoral politicians that I have ever—albeit in a very tiny way—regularly supported.
Clearly, Mamdani's win on Tuesday embodies obvious identity-related "firsts": youngest in a century, with South Asian heritage, from the Muslim faith, Africa-born, first immigrant Mayor in 50 years, first failed rapper, Bronx Science high school graduate, and so on. Some people celebrate these firsts. To be fair, they underline a certain openness in the American society.
But to me, what matters aren't any of these distinctions. What matters most is how well you walk through the fire—what one holds dear, tries to do, and does.
Critics of the mayor-elect frequently pose one challenge—how is he going to pay for his programs? Affordability is good in theory, but are these empty promises?
I will try to address how these promises can be fulfilled.
But first, some crucial clarifications.
Is Mamdani a "Communist", as President Trump has inflammatorily and indecently charged, in a redux of the Red Scare, which was a stain on American history? A core tenet of Communism is the abolition of private property. So, clearly not.
Is he a "Socialist"? Not that either. Socialism holds that the government should own and operate all or key businesses. That is not Mamdani's platform. Mamdani advocates better safety nets and services à la Bernie Sanders. Basically, his pitch is for capitalism with safety nets. These nets arguably enable life, spread costs, deal with market failure, and encourage entrepreneurship.
Now let's turn to Mamdani's populist promises, which have become a catechism here: freeze the rent, fast and free buses, city-run grocery stores, and free child care, all chosen perhaps for their memorability. Are they feasible, or a fantasy?
"Freeze the rent" applies to the privately-owned rent-stabilised apartments in which two of the eight million New Yorkers dwell. Past mayors have frozen these rents. So, this freeze will be nothing new. The program will basically cost the city nothing. It would, however, hit those landlords hard.
But then again, rent increases have far outstripped inflation. So, landlords may be able to bear it. There may also be accommodation provisions for hard-hit landlords, and there are other housing proposals as well. We shall see how they fare.
Making buses free would cost an estimated $600 million to $1.4 billion yearly, a small fraction of the overall city budget of about $115 billion. Over one million New Yorkers, disproportionately from the lower-income class, ride the bus daily. The Staten Island ferry, incidentally, is already free. It is the main public transport to Staten Island, which went strongly for Mamdani's rival, Andrew Cuomo, in the just-completed election.
As for city-run grocery stores, the proposal is for a pilot of five—yes, just five—government-owned stores. The concept might seem odd at first, and perhaps there are other methods with the potential to bring down food prices. But the theory is that food is a basic need, and that a lack of recent enforcement of a federal law and anti-competitive behavior have allowed big stores to exercise power over the supply chain, raising consumer prices. The belief is that using vacant government-owned land could bring down costs, and that other US cities have tried it.
Free child care would be the big-ticket item, costing $6 billion annually, Mamdani estimates. It is fairly indisputable that the nation suffers from a child care crisis. Costs in New York City can run up to $26,000 per year per family, and many must leave New York because of it. It is an idea with heart.
But how would all this be paid for? By a "millionaire tax"—a 2% tax on income above $1 million, which Mamdani estimates will generate $4 billion annually. Its burden, he reckons, will be more than offset by a recent 2.6% federal income tax reduction. And there is also the plan to raise corporate income taxes to match that of neighboring state New Jersey, which he estimates will generate about $5 billion yearly, while others estimate it will be as low as $2.9 billion. Collectively, the tax increases should be sufficient to fund the new proposals, although estimates vary.
These new taxes require state assent, which remains the big hurdle. Some players are amenable, and some are not. But with enough groundswell, and shifts in the Overton window, it could be done, as many other jurisdictions have shown. New York has a superstar economy, but people still need to be able to live.
Many say that the wealthy will flee New York. But, as someone once quipped (and no offense to Florida, which I love and where I once lived) the problem with moving to Florida is that you have to live in Florida. The wealthiest New Yorkers are the least mobile income group, Mamdani says, in line with a Fiscal Policy Institute study, which concluded that:
• High-earning New Yorkers move out of New York State at one-quarter the rate of the rest of the population during typical, non-Covid years,
• Out-migration for those most impacted by recent effective tax increases (in 2017 and 2021) did not increase significantly in response to the tax increases.
• When New York’s high earners move, they are more likely to move to other relatively high tax states.
This mirrors the national statistics. So, in the period to come, wealthy New Yorkers may not move just because of a 2% increase in income tax, especially when it is more than offset by a federal decrease. I suspect that businesses, though, might be more mobile.
In the end, we need to acknowledge Mamdani's ultimate rejoinder to his critics: New York is the wealthiest city in the wealthiest nation in the history of the world. The majority of New Yorkers (and indeed of Americans) are worried about meeting basic needs. But if the city shows the will, we can in this great country address our affordability crisis. And it is imperative that someone seriously try. More power to you, Zohran.
(Born in Kentucky and raised in Illinois, Jaykumar Menon is a human rights lawyer and social entrepreneur, co-founder of the Open Source Pharma Foundation, and lives in New York City.)