"‘Today, after three more months of painstaking work, I am proud to announce that we have closed the gap entirely down to zero. It has not been easy, but we have balanced the budget, and we have done so without placing the burden on the backs of working New Yorkers,’ Mamdani said.
That remaining $5.4 billion has been filled with $4 billion in aid from Albany and $1.77 billion in savings, mostly through efficiencies and not filling vacant positions. Mamdani said he wouldn’t tap into the city’s “rainy day fund” to balance the budget."
Our stupid monkey brains want to believe simple stupid truths and not the complex and nuanced reality.
A more sincere theory is that the billionaires managed to convince state legislators to divert pension funds to NYC to avoid the tax hikes, and Mamdani has no control over the state budgets.