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This sounds extremely non economically viable. The municipality which has monopoly on land taxes and costs will compete with stores that must pay taxes and rent? Won’t it just cause neighboring stores to close? Won’t a better option be subsidizing taxes for grocery stores, and let the discounts competitively pass unto the customers?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Major grocers are more inclined to form cartels on price than to engage in organic competitive action. These businesses are too large and incentives too perverse for free market dynamics to apply anymore.
>Major grocers are more inclined to form cartels on price than to engage in organic competitive action. Even if we take at face value that this is happening, their margins are famously low (ie. low single digits[1][2]) that any improvements are likely negligible. In the best case scenario where they're run as competently/efficiently as a normal grocery store, but don't take any profits, you'd be saving like 50 cents…
Mamdani has clearly taken lessons like these to heart.
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/07/nyregion/how-to-build-a-r...
"The Transportation Department workers arrived at 9:15 p.m., right on time. Mr. Boyce and his crew were ready, having fitted the roof and rear wall panel 30 minutes before. By Monday, the structure was nearly complete. “This is all like synchronized swimming,” Mr. Mansylla said. “To build a structure in New York City in, what, 48 hours? That’s as fast as it gets.”
This sounds extremely non economically viable. The municipality which has monopoly on land taxes and costs will compete with stores that must pay taxes and rent? Won’t it just cause neighboring stores to close? Won’t a better option be subsidizing taxes for grocery stores, and let the discounts competitively pass unto the customers?
Major grocers are more inclined to form cartels on price than to engage in organic competitive action. These businesses are too large and incentives too perverse for free market dynamics to apply anymore.
This sounds extremely non economically viable. The municipality which has monopoly on land taxes and costs will compete with stores that must pay taxes and rent? Won’t it just cause neighboring stores to close? Won’t a better option be subsidizing taxes for grocery stores, and let the discounts competitively pass unto the customers?
Why does everything needs to be economically viable?
This sounds extremely non economically viable. The municipality which has monopoly on land taxes and costs will compete with stores that must pay taxes and rent? Won’t it just cause neighboring stores to close? Won’t a better option be subsidizing taxes for grocery stores, and let the discounts competitively pass unto the customers?
This is the same trickle down economics principle that has proven not to work over, and over, and over again. There's exactly zero reason to believe these businesses would pass on the savings to consumers.
Consider! Ingles (a supermarket brand here in NC) is criticized for holding huge amounts of abandoned/vacant/dilapidated properties [0], which stifles competition and lets them hold an effective monopoly and makes neighborhoods objectively worse. It's not about the taxes. Don't underestimate a chain's ability to eat costs by maintaining their market position.
[0] https://avlwatchdog.org/opinion-ingles-markets-often-raises-...
I wonder what the margin is on groceries and if the stores can sustain themselves by operating at cost. I also want to know how they plan to handle pricing during shortages, e.g. eggs.
This sounds extremely non economically viable. The municipality which has monopoly on land taxes and costs will compete with stores that must pay taxes and rent? Won’t it just cause neighboring stores to close? Won’t a better option be subsidizing taxes for grocery stores, and let the discounts competitively pass unto the customers?
> This sounds extremely non economically viable. Many things government does are not economically viable. That's why they get left to government. > Won’t it just cause neighboring stores to close? The idea is to build these where that has already occurred.
I was very skeptical of these plans at first—as a New Yorker, I don’t exactly have a lot of trust in our city’s government to run things well. But I’ve come around. Let’s try something new! Let’s show people that local governments in the United States really are capable of making a difference in their daily lives. If it fails, well, we tried & we’ll keep trying.
Here's how this will pan out.
- A number of "officials" (friends) will get cushy jobs for running this program.
- It will lose millions of tax dollars
- a small portion of the population will get cheaper produce for a photo op
- Mamdani and friends will call it a success
- But net, this will be net negative for the city (ie. tax dollars to crony jobs and subsidizing food for some).
Whats the point? The USSR has tried this (subsidized grocery stores centrally planned). Lets not.
If on the other hand, the issue was hey its expensive to bring produce XYZ, so why don't we work to reduce that cost by legalizing Kei [1] trucks and exempt from tolls. Now that would be something interesting.
This sounds extremely non economically viable. The municipality which has monopoly on land taxes and costs will compete with stores that must pay taxes and rent? Won’t it just cause neighboring stores to close? Won’t a better option be subsidizing taxes for grocery stores, and let the discounts competitively pass unto the customers?
> This sounds extremely non economically viable. Many things government does are not economically viable. That's why they get left to government. > Won’t it just cause neighboring stores to close? The idea is to build these where that has already occurred.
(I say this as someone who is broadly in favor of NYC trying to run city-owned groceries in areas that are underserved.)
Earlier quoted context omitted.
>Major grocers are more inclined to form cartels on price than to engage in organic competitive action. Even if we take at face value that this is happening, their margins are famously low (ie. low single digits[1][2]) that any improvements are likely negligible. In the best case scenario where they're run as competently/efficiently as a normal grocery store, but don't take any profits, you'd be saving like 50 cents…
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noe_Valley_public_toilet Mamdani has clearly taken lessons like these to heart. https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/07/nyregion/how-to-build-a-r... "The Transportation Department workers arrived at 9:15 p.m., right on time. Mr. Boyce and his crew were ready, having fitted the roof and rear wall panel 30 minutes before. By Monday, the structure was nearly complete. “This is all like synchro…
From the wikipedia article:
>The toilet's original proposed cost of $1.7 million inspired media coverage and criticism of the San Francisco government.