Hoping for the demise of DiBlasiomics

Eight years ago, Bill DiBlasio entered the New York City governor's office, buoyed by support for his extremely progressive economic and social agenda. As he leaves office, it is a good time to take a look back.

How can a city fail while spending over $100 billion a year, including over $40,000 annually per K-12 public school student? The Manhattan Contrarian will tell you, but don't wait to hear it from DiBlasio or The New York Times. But boy, could this guy waste money, with over $1.5 billion going into programs created for and managed by his wife.

Per the Contrarian, let's start with DiBlasio's self-professed defining issue, income inequality:

If there was one issue more than any other that defined de Blasio’s run for Mayor back in 2013, it was income inequality. His signature campaign line was that New York was a “tale of two cities,” one rich and the other poor, and that that dichotomy must be ended by his progressive policies. In his first inaugural address, de Blasio called income inequality “the defining challenge of our time.” Surely, then, with all the additional government spending, de Blasio at least made a substantial dent in the City’s income inequality.

Actually, there is no evidence that de Blasio’s progressive policies and blowout spending made any measurable difference at all in income inequality. Granted, the government statistics on this issue come out with substantial lags, so that the most recent figures are a couple of years old. But I can’t think of any reason to believe that the last couple of years of data, when they emerge, will be anything different. The simple fact is that the only thing the government can do to move the income inequality statistics in a meaningful way is to drive away high income earners.

Okay, well maybe the money went to fund education better, with the goal of producing better test results among public school students.

From today’s New York Post cover story, headline “Fat Educats”:

In the last seven years under Mayor de Blasio, the DOE’s annual budget has ballooned from $20 billion to a whopping $31.6 billion – the size of Peru’s government spending, according to the city’s Independent Budget Office. That is not counting another $5 billion in pension costs.

I can’t think of any reason why the $5 billion of teacher pension costs is not part of the cost of educating the kids. So the total cost is $36.6 billion. For how many kids? Back in May the DOE released what it called an “audited” figure of some 1.094 million kids for school attendance in November 2020. But the Post reported on May 29, 2021:

Enrollment in city public schools has fallen below 890,000 students — down from more than a million kids a decade ago, according to internal Department of Education records viewed by The Post. In late January, DOE officials pegged this year’s enrollment at “approximately 960,000 students” — a 4 percent drop over last year after 43,000 kids exited the system. The latest school registers indicate an additional loss of 70,000 students.

$36.6 million for 890,000 students would be over $41,000 per student.

Here are the 2019 New York City results for 8th grade students for reading and for math. NYC’s average scores were well below the national average in both categories (for math, NYC students scored an average of 226, versus national average of 240; for reading, NYC average score was 252, versus national average of 262). Particularly embarrassing were the “proficiency” levels achieved in the two subjects by New York City black and Hispanic students. In math, 15% of black students, and 18% of Hispanic students scored “proficient” or better; in reading, it was 14% for blacks and 20% for Hispanics. Both tests are set so that about 50% of students nationwide score “proficient” or above.

People, we don't make this stuff up. And to New Yorkers: You got exactly what you voted for. As for how the New York Times will evaluate his tenure, one commenter offered the following:

I expect the NYT will lament that Mayor Wilhelm failed to enact enough tax increases and redistribution programs to achieve the income equality they desire. I'm sure they will also attribute poor school performance to inadequate spending on schools and teachers, and insufficient attention to CRT theory in school curriculums. If only NYC could find a mayor who could give the Leftist majority what they really want good and hard.