Mayor Adams’ silent rollout of welfare reform (as pointed out by the indispensable EJ McMahon) in New York is the worst political mistake the man has made.
A quick recap. . .
Gotham’s welfare rolls reached a staggering 1.2 million at their peak in 1995; Giuliani’s city hall saw this figure decline massively, to 425,000 in 2001; the trend continued under Mayor Mike Bloomberg as enrollment fell to 346,000.
Then came Bill de Blasio, the Park Slope dope who (as he did with crime, public education, and a host of other social issues) enacted policies that ultimately set the city back.
Using the pandemic as an excuse, he relaxed eligibility requirements, and by the time he left office, the number of beneficiaries returned to where it was in 2006.
Eric Adams, unforgivably, continued this ugly trend in the wrong direction.
It saw the total number of cash recipients in the city increase by 23%, to almost half a million – the highest level in 22 years.
About 357,000 of them have benefited from the Safety Net program, which receives no federal funding and is aimed primarily at single adults and couples without children.
And that The program has gained momentum under Adams, with record increases in 23 of the first 24 months of the mayor’s tenure. (And no, they are not illegal immigrants.)
Worse still, welfare recipients’ exit from dependency has stalled since the pandemic and has seen no improvement under Adams, with 10,000 to 15,000 recipients finding work per year – compared to nearly 50,000 in 2016.
An even uglier trend: Work participation rates for welfare recipients stood at 12% in mid-2023, compared to 25% just before COVID arrived and 34% under the last mandate of Bloomberg.
That’s a drop of 22 points, a collapse of nearly 65%, while rates never fell below 32%, even during the Great Recession.
Something seems to have changed permanently – and massively for the worse.
Of course, all this dependence comes at a cost that is at least in the hundreds of millions, with an annual rate of increase in safety net spending under Adams of nearly $500 million.
This is expected to see an additional $200 million added by spring 2025 as part of Governor Hochul’s new budget.
And don’t forget the next tsunami of migrant bills, which will reach $12 billion through fiscal year 2025.
Adams is leading the good fight on crime and public education and rightly sees our influx of migrants as a crisis – but he is completely wrong to let this happen, and unless he changes course, all New Yorkers will pay the price.
New York Post
