Leftist Mamdani is the answer to New York’s poverty, but political skills are needed to solve its problems

If Zohra Mamdani wins the highest seat of power in the financial capital of America, he will be the first ever mayor who is a Muslim, Indian-African immigrant to do so

Zohran Mamdani is the 33-year-old Democratic party candidate for the November New York City Mayoral election. 
If he wins, history will have been made. Mamdani will be the first Muslim, an Indian immigrant from Africa and that too of recent origin, a hard core socialist, and an unabashed supporter of the Palestinian cause, to occupy the coveted position of Mayor of the financial capital of the US, which is also home to the largest Jewish population outside of Israel.
Affordability Crisis  
Here are some of the key and radical promises made by Mamdani: He repeatedly emphasised the need to bring down the “affordability crisis” in New York. 
“This is a city where one in four of its people are living in poverty, a city where 500,000 kids go to sleep hungry every night,” Mamdani told the BBC. 
He has proposed to introduce a chain of city-owned grocery stores, a rent freeze on all rent-stabilised units, stricter accountability for landlords, and the creation of a Social Housing Development Agency to oversee the construction of 200,000 subsidised housing units over a three-year period.
Mamdani has promised universal childcare for kids aged six weeks to five years, affordable higher education by eliminating tuition fees in public colleges and removal of property tax exemptions extended to private universities. He also plans to set up a Department of Community Safety meant to administer housing assistance, community outreach, and a mental health service. 
Mamdani has proposed a plan to make all public buses fare-free and freeze subway fares. These measures are meant to increase ridership on these modes of transport, introduce climate protection, cut back on congestion and provide better infrastructure for those using pedestrian or cycling lanes. He has plans to grant sanctuary to undocumented workers, and legal aid and language access to immigrants. 
To implement the proposed measures, Mamdani is planning to introduce a 2% city income tax on citizens earning more than $1 million, along with an increase in corporate taxes.  
New York is Steeped in Poverty 
Mamdani is the first to highlight and harp on a facet of New York which has been hidden from the world for a long time. New York may be the financial capital of the US and home to the richest, but it is also abjectly poor, as stated by the latest Robin Hood Annual Poverty Tracker Report, done with the assistance of Columbia University’s Centre on Poverty and Social Policy. 
The report shows that 25% is the overall poverty rate in New York City, climbing beyond record highs observed in 2022. The study found that slightly over 2 million New Yorkers were poor, which was reflected in outsized increases in the cost of basic needs, including food, housing, and utilities. 
The 26% “child poverty rate” was the highest observed since the study began reporting child poverty rates in 2017.
It showed that the increased cost of living plunged an additional 100,000 New Yorkers into poverty. As a result, New York City’s poverty rate hit 25%, or 1 in 4 New Yorkers, up from 23% last year, and is nearly double the national poverty rate of 13%. 
Out of the 2.02 million New Yorkers now living in poverty, 1.6 million are adults and 420,000 are children. Poverty rates for adults (25%) and children (26%) each rose by 1 percentage point from the year prior, bringing the child poverty rate to the highest observed in Poverty Tracker data since the study began collecting data on child poverty in 2017. 
New York is a high-cost city where a family of four needs to make at least $50,000 just to survive. In 2023, the cost of five basic necessities that make up the poverty line: food, shelter, utilities, clothing, and telephone/ internet outpaced income growth and the overall rate of inflation, the report noted. This pushed the poverty threshold up to $47,190 for a renting family of four, 7.5% higher than the 2022 poverty threshold of $43,890, causing more New Yorkers to fall below this line.  
Material Hardship 
“Material hardship” is defined as facing severe difficulty affording food, housing, bills, and any form of medical hardship. In 2023, 43% of families could not cover a $400 expense with cash on hand or an equivalent. 
A large majority (73%) of parents in these families had to reduce their savings in recent years to cope with rising prices, and nearly one in three (31%) said they took on an additional job or more work to cope with inflation. More than half (54%) of the poor were “rent-burdened”, spending more than 30% of their cash income on rent.
The prevalence of work-limiting health problems (22%) and serious psychological distress (12%) among New Yorkers decreased slightly from the year prior. But the combined prevalence of both issues remained above pre-pandemic levels, reflecting the ongoing mental toll of the pandemic and its aftermath in the lives of New Yorkers, the report said.
Threatened Cuts
Threatened reductions in vital supports would be nothing short of a mass impoverishing event, warned Richard R. Buery, Jr., CEO of Robin Hood. The recommendations of the Child Poverty Reduction Advisory Council, which is tasked with developing strategies to reduce child poverty in the State by half, should be implemented. And the Federal government should fully back the New York State government, Buery added. New York State lawmakers should implement policies that would cut child poverty in half, as mandated by the Child Poverty Reduction Act (CPRAC) of 2022. 

Can Mamdani Deliver?
Jason Beeferman, writing in Politico, asks the crucial question as to whether leftist ideologues like Zohran Mamdani can effectively govern a major metropolis. 
As Mayor, Mamdani would have vast resources in the form of funds and manpower. He will have over $115 billion and more than 300,000 employees. He will also have the nation’s largest police force. While there is no dearth of money and manpower, the job demands a high degree of political compromise, Beeferman says. 
Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson, who was backed by socialists when he defeated incumbent Lori Lightfoot two years ago, found himself beset by problems. What sounded good in theory translated into dysfunction, driven by fiscal missteps and political inexperience, Beeferman recalls. 
And Mamdani is more radical than Johnson. According to Beeferman, even some of Mamdani’s endorsers and allies privately question his ability to manage a sprawling bureaucracy. He will have a lot of persuasion to do to convince people that he can implement what he has promised. 
Beeferman wants Mamdani to note that halfway into Brandon Johnson’s mayoralty, a referendum to institute the “mansion tax” failed. His $300 million property tax hike proposal was voted down unanimously, 50-0, by the City Council, and his plan for government-funded grocery stores was ultimately scrapped.
However, leftist Bernie Sanders’ experience as Mayor of Burlington, Vermont, would show the brighter side. As Mayor, Sanders found success working with the City Council by building a coalition with Republicans in the body. 
“A democratic socialist mayor cannot exclusively hire democratic socialists, and I think that’s a practical point,” Beeferman said, quoting a New York Democratic lawmaker. “It’s actually about forming a functional coalition of sorts,” the lawmaker added.
Assuming that Mamdani does get elected as New York’s Mayor in November, the question as to whether he will be a successful Mayor will remain. He is only 33 years old, with no administrative experience. Besides, his religious and ethnic profile, his immigrant status and his radical political views could continue to dog his political prospects.