Don’t buy blaming Hudson Yard’s imploding on covid. It was always a ponzi scheme designed to funnel public wealth out of poor neighborhoods and illicit foreign wealth into America. It was never designed for New Yorkers or to “succeed” on its own

Like every other rot in our public policy, covid only exposed what was already there and sped up the failure. ie Hudson Yard’s didn’t create new econ activity, it just shifted it around on the public’s dime. That’s been the disastrous model of the city + state for decades

Meanwhile actual job growth came from places like small startups/biz and ppl like CUNY grads that have been managing largely on their own without massive public investments, in fact quite the opposite

But the rotten politics of NY meant big real estate developers, corporate monopolies and extremist billionaires kept sucking up all the public resources on boondoggles and heist jobs while public infrastructure fell apart

Which is why the big wins by @nycDSA @DSAForTheMany and allies this cycle are so exciting! @realDonaldTrump and @NYGovCuomo are products of this tired old NY real estate bullshit. It never really “worked” for people but now everyone knows it and wants a new path that does