On Monday, Red State posted an article about New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s proposed grocery stores. Initially the grocery stores were to require identification to prove you were a New York resident, but evidently that has changed (possibly due to public reaction–needing an ID to buy groceries but not to vote was a bridge too far).
On Monday, The New York Post reported:
Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s promised city-owned grocery stores won’t require ID from shoppers, his administration confirmed Monday — allowing non-New Yorkers to take advantage of the discounted goods.
The five planned taxpayer-subsidized stores — which are set to sell a “core basket of goods” at 30% below retail prices — will offer a free, voluntary membership card program, though documents show it will not require a residency check.
Mamdani administration officials revealed the membership program last week when facing questions from reporters about how they’d stop bad actors from buying in bulk and taking advantage of the deals on offer.
Red State notes:
Now, if you’re like Marty McFly and you’re saying “I’ve seen this one, this is classic!” that’s because government-run stores used to be a thing.
Way back in the Soviet Union. If you missed that one because you went to a government-run school, you’re in luck.
Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev provided an iconic moment in Cold War history when his first encounter with an American grocery store was a jolting experience.
That’s because communist-run grocery stores were nearly barren of basic foodstuffs due to the inability of the state planners to manage supply and demand.
A few years later, this scene was recreated when Soviet cosmonaut Gherman Titov toured a San Francisco Safeway.
We could place bets on how long it will take the city-run grocery store to fail and how much it will eventually cost New York City taxpayers. The sad part of this is that the prices in the store will undercut the local merchants and drive them out of business. Eventually there will be no grocery stores in New York City. Unfortunately, Mayor Mamdani does not understand or chooses not to understand the free market.