Zohran Mamdani’s policies would be an economic disaster

Policies that take large amounts of income away from people who have earned it and give it to those who haven’t, never work.

Zohran Mamdani, a New York State Assemblymember and presumptive Democratic nominee for Mayor of New York City, has a platform apparently focused on addressing the city’s affordability crisis while promoting social and economic justice. He has, however, suggested several policies that will worsen just the problems he seeks to solve.

He wants to freeze rents for rent stabilized apartments. He says this will provide relief to tenants of those apartments. The problem is that if the rent is frozen, what happens when costs increase? He will use taxpayers’ dollars to cover the higher cost. That means taxpayers will further subsidize this housing, leading to higher taxes for all NYC residents.

He further wants to use union workers to build 200,000 new housing units. These, too, will be rent-subsidized homes, meaning the NYC taxpayers will pay more in taxes. The required union labor will significantly raise the construction cost, meaning more taxpayer dollars are needed.

As he adds more city-subsidized units, private developers of residential units, who can’t compete, will leave the market, or they will build just for the higher end of the market. The problem…