New York City dished out welfare checks to nearly 865,000 people over the past year \u2014 a historic handout that has sent public assistance spending skyrocketing to a record-breaking $2.7 billion, The Post can reveal.<\/p>\n
The city\u2019s Department of Social Services served a staggering 864,999 welfare recipients for the 12-month period ending May 30, a whopping 55.7% increase since 2022 and totals the Big Apple hasn\u2019t seen in roughly 30 years, an examination of agency records found.<\/a><\/p>\n The city\u2019s taxpayer-funded budget for cash-assistance payments soared even higher \u2014\u00a0up 72.6%, from $1.57 billion in fiscal 2022 to its current $2.71 billion for the fiscal year that began July 1.<\/p>\n Mayor Zohran Mamdani inherited the welfare crisis<\/a> from his predecessor Eric Adams \u2014 but there\u2019s been little change since the socialist took office in January.<\/p>\n And critics fear it\u2019s only a matter of time before he pushes more millionaires and billionaires out of the Big Apple \u2014 and with them jobs \u2013 sending welfare rolls even further through the roof.<\/p>\n New York City cut welfare checks to nearly 865,000 over the past year \u2014 the most cash assistance it\u2019s doled out in three decades. And critics fear it will only get worse as socialist NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani pushes more millionaires and billionaires out of the Big Apple \u2014 and with them jobs. Robert Miller for NY Post<\/p>\n \u201cThis is the Communist Playbook 101: make everyone reliant on the government, so the masses have no choice but to support the people signing their checks,\u201d predicted Councilwoman Joann Ariola (R-Queens).<\/p>\n \u201cThis is only going to get worse as the Democratic Socialists of America ramp up their tax-the-rich rhetoric and drive even more jobs out of the city. With every job they force out, the far left gets one more person dependent on them. It\u2019s all part of the plan.\u201d<\/p>\n Adams inherited an annual public-assistance caseload totaling 555,311 in 2021, the final year of the administration of former Mayor and avowed Marxist Bill de Blasio, and watched it soar to 864,608 by the time he left office at the end of 2025, records show.<\/p>\n The city\u2019s taxpayer-funded budget for cash-assistance payments has soared 72.6% over the past five years, from $1.57 billion in fiscal 2022 to its current $2.71 billion for the fiscal year that began July 1. Getty Images<\/p>\n When The Post asked the DSS in February 2024 to explain why welfare rolls were rising under Adams, agency officials blamed the economic impact of the pandemic.<\/a><\/p>\n They insisted New Yorkers were reeling from soaring rents, food costs and other expenses \u2014 coupled with the federal and state government ending eviction moratoriums and payments offered during the height of the COVID-19 era.<\/p>\n Two-and-half years later, the pandemic excuses no longer fly, critics said.<\/p>\n The DSS declined to elaborate on why it believes the problem has worsened or address critics\u2019 concerns that it will become even bleaker under Mamdani.<\/p>\n GOP Queens Councilwoman Joann Ariola said the ripped the rising welfare roll totals, saying, \u201cThis is the Communist Playbook 101: make everyone reliant on the government, so the masses have no choice but to support the people signing their checks.\u201d Luiz C. Ribeiro for NY Post<\/p>\n \u201cThis administration is focused on using every available tool to advance economic justice and better support New Yorkers in need,\u201d the agency said in a statement.\u00a0<\/p>\n It also touted that 70% of cash-assistance\u00a0applications are being processed on time this year \u2014 a huge improvement from the Adams administration that saw its numbers dip as low as a paltry 14% from July through October of 2022.<\/p>\n Monthly caseloads this year have begun to slightly drop, including May, which saw 576,123 New Yorkers pocket handouts \u2014 or 26,391(4%) less than the same month a year earlier, the agency added.<\/p>\n When Rudy Giuliani became mayor in 1994, he inherited an even bigger welfare crisis, and the number of New Yorkers getting monthly cash assistance\u00a0soared to record 1,160,593 <\/a>by the time he implemented a series of reforms in March 1995.<\/p>\n He made getting recipients back to work a priority \u2014 especially those who preferred collecting checks to clocking in at a job \u2014\u00a0and\u00a0pushing welfare reform initiatives<\/a>\u00a0like his Work Experience Program, where many recipients helped clean city parks and streets and answered phones in city offices in exchange for temporary assistance.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Unemployed Americans wait in line at a NYC welfare office in 1974. Getty Images<\/p>\n The monthly numbers plummeted to 497,100 midway through 2001, Giuliani\u2019s final year in office, and the downward spiral continued under his successor, Michael Bloomberg. In December 2013, Bloomberg\u2019s last month in office, 346,398 New Yorkers collected unemployment checks.<\/p>\n In May 2014, under then-Mayor de Blasio, the city\u2019s monthly rolls dropped to 336,403 \u2014 its lowest since the early 1960s. However, the monthly recipients rose to 384,523 by the time de Blasio left office at the end of 2021 in part because of policies the far-left pol implemented to help simplify the application process and the economic strains of the pandemic.<\/p>\n The rise in welfare checks comes as Mamdani this week continued to push his \u201ctax-the-rich\u201d agenda \u2014 even after the nonpartisan Citizens Budget Commission released a bombshell analysis <\/a>on Monday showing New York lost the largest share of US millionaires<\/a> of any state since 2010, resulting in a nearly $11 billion loss in much-needed yearly local tax revenue.<\/p>\n Stephen Eide, a senior fellow at the conservative think tank Manhattan Institute who tracks public assistance, said New Yorkers \u201cshould be concerned about welfare growing\u201d further under Mamdani.<\/p>\n \u201cFirst, you do need a growing economy to move people off the rolls and into jobs,\u201d he said. \u201cA growing economy takes capital. The mayor\u2019s socialist animus towards billionaires begs the question of where that capital\u2019s supposed to come from.<\/p>\n \u201cSecond, I don\u2019t think we know that the mayor even thinks historically high welfare rolls is a policy failure, as all his predecessors did. In housing, Mamdani\u2019s definition of policy is getting as many people on subsidized housing as possible. If Mamdani thinks the case of cash assistance is different, he hasn\u2019t said.\u201d<\/p>\n Councilman Phil Wong (D-Queens) ripped the massive caseload, saying it\u2019s a sign \u201cour economy isn\u2019t working for too many New Yorkers.<\/p>\n \u201cInstead of pursuing policies that drive away businesses, jobs, and investment, City Hall should be focused on creating an environment where more people can earn a paycheck, support their families, and no longer need government assistance,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"New York City dished out welfare checks to nearly 865,000 people over the past year \u2014 a historic…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":943396,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5122],"tags":[5229,21481,40896,263,5289,420,5248,12862,405,403,5226,5225,5228,5227,80,21281,5681,67,586,132,5230,68,1154,2969,4748,5301],"class_list":["post-943395","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-america","tag-bill-de-blasio","tag-democratic-socialists-of-america","tag-employment","tag-eric-adams","tag-jobs","tag-metro","tag-michael-bloomberg","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-newyork","tag-newyorkcity","tag-ny","tag-nyc","tag-politics","tag-rudy-giuliani","tag-social-services","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-us-news","tag-usa","tag-welfare","tag-zohran-mamdani"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116941196328486577","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/943395","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=943395"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/943395\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/943396"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=943395"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=943395"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=943395"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}