There is a lot of expressing of opinions both by Republicans and Democrats about the mayoral election in New York City. I believe that Zohran Mamdani will be elected mayor of New York and that will provide a rare opportunity for a real-life experiment. There are a lot of predictions being made and, frankly, I doubt that many of the most dire will happen but it will provide an opportunity for testing these hypotheses.
Will
- Crime increase substantially?
- A substantial number of New Yorkers flee the city?
- Anti-semitism increase?
- New York become even less affordable?
My own view is that I doubt that Mr. Mamdani will get many of his proposals enacted into law and the most amazing thing will be how ordinary things are.
Victimization and 911 calls might increase but I suspect that crime reports will show a decrease in serious crime. The only way that crime will show an increase is if a) the increase is so large denying it is is impossible and b) if mayors, police chiefs, etc. were rewarded for increasing rates of serious crime.
It will be interesting to see what happens.
One thing I’ve learned is that the Mayor doesn’t have a lot of control over several important aspects of city management, so a lot of what he wants to do will be contingency on NY state compliance.
I also think he will have a weak mandate since it looks like he will win with only about 44% of the votes, based on recent polls. He’s winning in large part because he’s the Democratic nominee and the opposition is unpopular and divided.