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Culture War yes/no? I'm not going to have a long post here, since I am more genuinely asking questions about how this is supposed to work, but: Mayor Mamdani's grocery stores. Good idea or disaster waiting to happen?
My own, very damn subjective, view on this is that they'll turn out to be a typical boondoggle/pork barrel project for NYC internal politics, and that most of whatever funding available will go on paying baksheesh to vested interests, giving reward positions to party loyalists placed in charge of administering the scheme, and once Mamdani is out of office, these places will shut up shop (literally) and be empty commercial sites that made no real difference in the long run.
This is even before we get into all the interesting and varied possibilities of fraud and gaming the system.
I see that
heone of his administration announced the necessity for ID cards so non-NYC residents can't load up on cheap groceries, which would seem to indicate thathe'sthey are notatotal fools and do have some awareness of how things can go wrong, but also given the protesting about requiring ID for voting and how this places a disproportionate burden on marginalised communities, how will he square the circle of "this is to serve marginalised communities but also we want ID"? If the anti-ID lot claim that requiring ID will not, for example, prevent voter fraud then how can requiring ID prevent grocery fraud? People who can't manage to get a driver's licence will manage to get a "library card-esque" ID?Also I understand that these stores will be run by private operators and hoo-boy. Worst of both worlds? I think this article (from an Irish person) points out the problems there, and anyone who has worked in retail will have a good idea of the kinds of problems that will be faced: shoplifting, union jobs (with corresponding high wages and good conditions, which will drive up costs and require a ton of the city government pumping in funding) or minimum-wage jobs?, challenging IDs for non-native New Yorkers, people buying the cheap staples then reselling them (as with loose cigarettes), what if the marginalised communities don't want fruit and veg, they want cigarettes, booze, soda and chips? and the likes:
I disagree with the article about this being stealth socialism, but I do agree that this is a vanity project that will not survive Mamdani's term in office. It probably would be better to encourage Aldi/Lidl to set up stores in these areas for their cheap staples proven model, and if they don't want to/can't get to set up in such places, I think it would be a good idea to consider why not and what that means for the state-run grocery stores:
People like to talk about how shoplifting from big chain stores isn't really theft because insurance covers all that and they make millions in profit, but such big chains make those profits by ruthless pricing and enforcing economies of scale and using their clout to pressure suppliers for discounts. Unless it is going to be the likes of Walmart operating one city-owned grocery store in each borough (and why would they even bid for such small potatoes outfits?) then the enforced "30% below market prices" will have to be made up elsewhere, and that will most likely be on: minimum-wage staff, fewer staff, mark-ups on the other items that are not the mandated staples, and finding some way around the limitation on "no hot food, lottery tickets, alcohol or cigarettes". Maybe Aldi or Lidl will snap these up as opportunities to grow brand loyalty in these areas? I dunno!
We'll see how it works out. I'm not sanguine, but somebody tell me how this could work if done properly?
I think it is mainly doomed because it starts with a bad analysis of "the problem".
There are things called food deserts, sure, but why? New York is one of the wealthiest cities in the world, even the poor are extremely wealthy by global standards. Go to just about any Asian city and you don't have to look hard for fresh anything, cooked anything, etc. There are markets all over.
New York doesn't allow open air markets, so that doesn't help. But there are still plenty of shops everywhere. Why aren't the shops selling a bunch of fresh ingredients?
Put yourself in the mind of a poor New Yorker. You've just acquired a bunch of fresh ingredients for cooking. Now take them back to your apartment. Your tiny, shitty apartment, with multi decade old cooking appliances, lack of cookware, and then when you finish out how to microwave the meal to completion you can serve them on your non-existent dishes and wash those non-existent dishes by hand in your sink because you don't have a working dish washer. Do we all see the problem? You have to be rich to afford a nice enough place to cook for yourself in New York. Even giving away food for free will not solve this problem.
The food deserts exist because of a lack of demand. And even giving away free food won't be enough to get poor New Yorkers cooking their own healthy food.
They buy snacks, easy microwave meals, and takeout food. If you can make all of those things more healthy without increasing their price you might be able to get more New Yorkers actually eating healthy.
But why do you even want them eating healthy? Is it because you want them to be less obese and more healthy? Well good news, we have a solution for that, they are called GLP-1s. Just subsidize them and hand em out like candy to New Yorkers. Or have bodegas sell them.
In conclusion Mamdani's end goals are attainable. He has just chosen to go about it in a roundabout and silly way that will accomplish nothing.
I've lived in a large city pretty much my entire adult life so far (mercifully I'm moving out in a couple of months), one that is not unlike NYC in a lot of ways. I don't think this is that much of a real problem. Most apartments in those cities have at least a stove/oven. In most of those cities, old unkillable appliances that are decades old but still very functional are in circulation and if you know a few people you can generally get one for free (if you supply the labor of moving it) or very cheap. If not, you can get a cheap single burner resistive cooktop, I see one for 15$CAD on walmart from a brand (not a good brand, but a brand). You can probably get one cheaper in a pawn shop, or if you take a trip to chinatown and look around the stores there. The small, cramped, cluttered stores especially. Pots, pans, utensils, plates, again go to Chinatown and check the stores there. I'd bet for 10$ you can leave with a pot and a pan and at least one plate and one set of utensils. Or a dollar store will have some. If you want better quality, head to a thrift store and get a second hand one. As for doing dishes, I've lived 20 years without a dishwasher, it's fine really. My guess is that the entire set of what you need to cook a basic meal can be had for under 50$. I wouldn't be surprised if you could get all of it under 40$. A cooktop (portable if need be), one pot, one pan, a stirring spoon, a spatula, a cooking knife (doesn't need to be chef's knife), a plate, a bowl, a fork, knife and spoon.
The problem, and I agree there is a problem and it's not the availability of fresh food, is motivation management. Ultimately cooking is, most days for most people, not motivating. There's other things they would rather be doing, and if there isn't they likely have little energy left after their day to put into it. I don't want to say the poor are uniquely lazy, it's not that simple. I'm pretty lazy quite often too. But poor people live in an environment that doesn't help them be very motivated either. Some people are uniquely self-motivated; great for those people, even if they start at the very bottom of the economic ladder, they tend to be able to climb up a few rungs over their lifetime and that's great. Most people aren't like that. They need to have grown up in a good nurturing environment that kept them focused on doing annoying things even if they are annoying to do to keep doing it as an adult. If when you were young your parents (if you're lucky enough to have grown up with both of them) worked double-shifts at the depression and alcoholism factory, your chances aren't great.
I guess mileage may vary. I have not lived in a large city like that. The friends that I had who lived there had all those complaints. And maybe yes it doesn't take much to do a setup to allow for cooking. But it is a one time hurdle that still has to be jumped over, so I'd at least add it to the behavior stack.
I had been about to write a whole thing about the hassle of cooking. I ran out of time and wrapped up the comment. So I heavily agree with you. I have a family of 5 and I am the primary cook in the house. We still end up eating out 2 to 7 times a week (I know that is a big variance, but lots of variance in my life right now). The home cooked meals are as simple and time saving as I can make them. I'm throwing pasta in a big pot, putting pre-breaded frozen chicken in an air fryer, and using microwave ready vegetable packs. And sometimes I'm skipping those second two things. On the harder side sometimes I am making meal kits from hello fresh that take like 1.5 hours. I'm trying to make this as easy on myself as possible and it is still a huge mental strain and stressor all week every week. At this moment I am typing this comment rather than figuring out what I'm gonna do for dinner tonight since the fridge is barren. I do actually enjoy cooking and making things, but that is something i want to do once or twice a week when I have lots of spare time.
My brother in Christ, you need to embrace crock-pots.
I second the crock pot and more generally, large batch cooking (though I suppose a lot of stuff is batched when it's for 5) as much as possible. There are lots of beans/rice/meat/vegetables that are set & forget and will make your house smell amazing when you get home. An oven roasted chicken on a bed of vegetables also goes a long way.
Also pressure cookers like Instant Pot can give you comparable-ish results to a crock-pot in a fraction of the time.
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