Overall, it seems that the New York City public wants a change in the local government. People want to move away from a financially driven government to one that takes care of the poor and homeless. It appears that New York City has been successful since the Wall Street Crisis in 2008. However, this success has been largely concentrated in the richest 1% of people living in the city. This has mainly been due to Bloomberg focusing more on the financial aspects of the city than the public’s well being. He wants to take care of his own employees, and other public workers such as police officers. However, there has been an increasing amount of homeless people living in the city, as well as a rise in poverty. While the rich have become richer, the poor have become poorer. The current minimum wage is not enough to sustain a family because taxes and the cost of living continue to rise. This is one of the main reasons the public has turned to supporting de Blasio. He wants to make a change to support the homeless and the poor members of society instead of the rich. He wants to make a better public school system that is more available to the public instead of the competitive, cutthroat system Bloomberg has in place. I agree with the article that it is mainly the atmosphere of change that is propelling him forward. It is a combination of past events and the current feeling of unrest that is the main reason de Blasio has the support of the public. If there were another candidate who was asking for change like de Blasio, would he have as much support? People seem to just want change to happen, I do not think they really mind who is bringing that change. As long as the poor are taken care of, they will be happy. However, most methods of helping the poor involve taking away from the wealthy, which the wealthy would not support. This makes political change extremely hard and slow. The public needs to understand that as much as de Blasio promised to change the way the New York City government is working, it will take a long time for this 180-degree switch to happen. The public may get frustrated during this time, but it is crucial for the public to continue to stand behind whoever they believe will bring the change they want. Without public support there is no way that the issue of the rise in homelessness and the rise in poverty will be fixed.
Discussion question: If there were another candidate who was asking for change like de Blasio, would he have as much support?
How do we make an economic transition from the trickle-down system implemented in our nation’s policies?
It is understood that a lot of the progress made in New York City has been short term fixes if any to the growing wealth gap of the citizens. I grew up in Jamaica Estates, Queens. It is a gated community with upper middle-class residents, along with its own funded security patrol. Donald Trump grew up in his childhood home in the very same neighborhood. However, when you walk out of the neighborhood you end up in Jamaica, Queens also known as one of the most dangerous areas in the borough. This is no surprise to a typical New Yorker. We have come to define the city with the characteristic of this “two-tier urbanism.” The real question is how do we make a change to a situation that has become commonplace?
It seems de Blasio’s main strategy is by intervening in unionization laws as well as reexamining the city’s 70 billion dollar budget and allocating funds to social services for the underprivileged. He also plans on raising taxes on the upper class to generate over 500 million dollars in revenue. With proper management of the money, there can be strides in resolving the issue as long as the residents bring the attention back where it is needed.