By Mark W. Fowler

Progressives and their supporters never learn. Now that Zohran Mamdani is mayor of New York City, he has stumbled over a big difference between governing and making campaign promises.

While proposing a $127 billion budget, about $12 billion more than the last budget, he discovered there isn’t enough money to fund all his free stuff. Having failed to persuade the governor to raise taxes on millionaires, he has proposed raising property taxes on middle class property owners by 9.5%. This will affect three million homeowners and 100,000 commercial properties.

The average wage of this cohort of taxpayers is $120,000. It turns out that free daycare, city-owned grocery stores, free buses, and subsidized healthcare cost money, and that money can only come from taxpayers. While voters are all in for free stuff, they are reluctant to have their taxes raised to pay for that free stuff. In short, in less than six months, Mamdani — who had no real-life experience managing anything as complicated as a hot dog stand — has, along with his supporters, slammed into reality.

That there is a difference between what you can propose and what you can deliver is something progressives never learn. They live in a fantasy land and presuppose that taxpayers will willingly give away more of their money to fund whatever utopian vision elected officials have. But progressives never really care about those whose votes they seek. They care about power and assuming a moral superiority.

They pay no price for their foolishness and are indifferent to the hardships they inflict on others. Like the Pharisees of old, they seek the acclamation of others who are likeminded. They wish to be seen and acknowledged rather than finding solutions to real-life problems. Mandani has wealthy parents, and it appears that he has lived off their beneficence for some time.

It gets worse. Presently, New York City is facing a $5.4 billion budget deficit. In addition to increased spending, Mamdani proposes to close this budget gap not by cutting waste, fraud, and abuse but by borrowing from the Retiree Health Benefits Trust and the rainy-day fund. Like most dreamers, Mamdani thinks if you move change from one pocket to the next, you suddenly have more money to spend.

There is one small problem with this approach. The Retiree Health Benefits Trust ran out of money in December 2025. To replenish that fund, New York officials borrowed from another fund, which was intended to cover costs associated with two popular premium health plans. If only they had more pockets, they could keep this Ponzi scheme going.

Part of the problem is that various labor unions in New York never saw an accumulated governmental fund they could leave untouched. Just as Congress saw fit to deplete the Social Security Trust Funds, so does the city government of New York deplete funds intended for known future expenses in the hopes they can avoid raising taxes and shower the voters with freebies. By the time the financial house of cards collapses, they will be long gone. Many states, including New York, have billions of dollars’ worth of unfunded pension liabilities.

The Affordable Care Act front-loaded benefits and back-loaded expenses, and as predicted, premiums have skyrocketed, American taxpayers are stuck with the bill. In 2024, UnitedHealthcare revenue jumped 8% to $400 billion, producing net profits of $14.4 billion.

The chaos in New York continues. A group if individuals was photographed throwing snowballs at NYPD officers. Many were hit in the head or face, and two were treated at hospitals for injuries. Mayor Mamdani said all he saw was a snowball fight that got out of hand. District Attorney Alvin Bragg refuses to prosecute the offenders. Now, NYPD officers will be targeted at more aggressive levels. It won’t be long before Mamdani and Bragg are astonished at complaints that the city no longer feels safe.

This is the roadmap for destroying the habitability of one of the most fascinating cities in the world.