[HN Gopher] Europeans recognize Zohran Mamdani's policies as 'no...
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Europeans recognize Zohran Mamdani's policies as 'normal'
Author : mykowebhn
Score : 31 points
Date : 2025-11-06 22:22 UTC (38 minutes ago)
(HTM) web link (www.theguardian.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.theguardian.com)
| mytailorisrich wrote:
| The Guardian strikes again... as an European those policies are
| not " _a given_ "... shockingly, we need to buy tickets to ride
| the bus, childcare is not usually free overall, and rent freezes
| don't work. It is also not so normal to claim to be a bona fide
| socialist (and Europe knows more than most what this means).
| afavour wrote:
| I think you can nitpick the detail but the broader point is
| still true. Yes, you still pay for the bus, but it's heavily
| subsidised. Yes, you still pay for childcare but government
| subsidies make it _wildly_ more affordable than it is today for
| New Yorkers.
|
| The _general_ pitch is "raise taxes to make life more
| affordable for all". That's an idea Europeans can identify
| with.
| LtdJorge wrote:
| We may identify with it. Doesn't mean we'd like to, though.
| dekken_ wrote:
| > That's an idea Europeans can identify with.
|
| To a point, when we stop seeing a social benefit from our
| taxes, it starts to look more like theft.
| afavour wrote:
| This just in: some people don't like paying taxes
| dekken_ wrote:
| You may want to review what caused the American
| revolution.
| afavour wrote:
| You don't think it's absurdly simplistic to say "taxes =
| revolution"?
|
| It's not like Mamdani snuck into power. Voters chose him
| specifically on the agenda he proposed. Why would they
| revolt?
| dekken_ wrote:
| If you have no say in how much you are taxed, that is
| taxation without representation.
|
| Seems you completely missed the point.
| ryandrake wrote:
| Based on some of the hysterical commenters yesterday, you'd
| think that Lenin himself is moving into the mayor's office.
| People's sense of scale and the Overton window are so wacky
| right now.
| afavour wrote:
| As a New Yorker it's been exhausting. So many ill-informed
| takes, like "he wants rent control!!", ignorant of the fact
| that NYC already has rent control and has in some form or
| another since WW2.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| It turns out that wide swaths of the electorate are some
| combination of ignorant, uneducated, and low functioning
| with a tad of fear thrown in. It's unfortunate.
| mytailorisrich wrote:
| Err, no, Europeans don't identify with that.
|
| Europeans are not a single opinion entity that is left wing,
| don't work past 5pm and read Sartre at night, after the union
| meeting.
| epolanski wrote:
| Hmm, the things he lists have very little to do with being
| leftist or rightist.
|
| Moreover, modern rights are often economically more to the
| left than modern lefts are (see Meloni, PiS in Poland,
| etc).
| akavi wrote:
| The bus (and the subway) in NYC are also already heavily
| subsidized. There is also already heavily subsidized
| childcare in NYC (3k, preK).
|
| The article in general takes the approach of listing a small
| handful of (usually very small) polities that have one of
| Mamdani's proposed policies, and then claim that it is
| therefore "normal" across Europe.
| mytailorisrich wrote:
| I think a big issue some Americans have is that they think
| socialism is great because it is the European model.
|
| 1. Europe is not socialist.
|
| 2. The European welfare state is essentially bankrupt in many
| countries.
| greekrich92 wrote:
| $2500/month is cheap childcare in NYC. $2K/m for a 1 bedroom is
| cheap. How much do those things cost in Aalborg or Malmo or
| Wurzburg?
| epolanski wrote:
| I'm European too and I second this, free transport, free
| childcare or rent freezes are not givens, they aren't even
| common.
|
| As for him claiming to being a socialist I don't find anything
| wrong/strange with it. US really needs this kind of politicians
| too.
| newyankee wrote:
| Have most Western countries mostly given up on supply side
| policies for housing price stablisation as an option ? Odd given
| how much construction tech has improved.
| bgwalter wrote:
| His _announced policies_. Everyone lies before the election. He
| may push through one or two things but the rents will be higher
| next year. If he turns really socialist (which he probably isn 't
| and won't be), they'll get rid of him, "one way or another", as a
| president has eloquently put it.
| arjie wrote:
| So long as the money comes out of their state and local taxes,
| it's a worthwhile effort. Then once they've proven it, we can
| take it broader. To be honest, federal income taxes should go
| down and we should let the states and cities take a far more
| active role in tax collection and execution of policy.
|
| There's obviously the failure mode of California where no town
| wants to have new homes and all of them want jobs, so perhaps the
| state is the right level for this.
| gooseus wrote:
| This is funny because I remember having to pay a euro to take a
| leak at public train stations, and telling people that if they
| tried to implement this at Port Authority or Penn Station that
| people would lose their minds at the indignity.
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