Half-Price MetroCards for the Poor Gain Support, but Not From de Blasio

My mother, who is old enough to remember when the subway fare was a nickle, and lives in Florida asks me sometimes about the current subway fare. She is shocked to hear what it is now and asks how people working blue collar jobs can afford to ride. It's a question old progressive de Blasio should have to answer. Oh, and as Cuomo has the election coming up, let's ask him, too.

Fares should be reduced for everyone who rides public transportation. It's a self-selecting needy population, obviously, because anyone who has financial means doesn't opt to take the filthy, crowded, poorly-running subway or stand on a corner waiting for buses that take way too long to come and then are packed to dangerous levels.

increasing subway fares is a form of regressive tax, I believe. it hurts the people who can least afford it and depend on it the most. this city would not function -- millionaires would not make their millions -- without subway-riding workers able to get to their jobs. Make subway riding more affordable and accessible (children have to pay to use a subway to get to school?!?!) AND tax corporations who benefit because their workers have a means to get to work.

And this is something all New Yorkers should remember when it comes to Mr. deBlasio's next run for higher office -- which inevitably, it will. If he can't get beyond his own ego-driven battle with Andrew Cuomo for the sake of the hard working people of this city, who to a great extent are being punished by the rising costs of living here, then there's no way he deserves their votes. Remember November.

How many poor New Yorkers does DeBlasio want each millionaire to subsidize? At $0.60 per ride, that works out to $312 in subsidy for each individual (assuming 260 round-trip days traveled per year). For 800,000 beneficiaries, that's approximately $250 million per year. There are about 15,000 taxpayers who earn more than $1 million. So each millionaire is required to subsidize about 50 other residents each year.

This is a short-sighted and poor use of money. The subway desperately needs to be fixed for ALL New Yorkers. Subway delays cost on average about $864,000 PER DAY. https://ny.curbed.com/2017/10/12/16466416/mta-subway-delay-nyc-economy-l... So here's an idea. If we have a few extra hundred million laying around to throw at the subway, why not direct it towards something that will generate a return on investment (improved signals, newer cars) while helping a much larger portion of the subway riding populace?

Wonder if all who might qualify really have exhausted all avenues available to them--I doubt it. Start asking those near the bottom what they have done to find higher paying work, improve their skill set, further their education, get child support, work more hours, etc., many will swear they have done enough. Who are these people? Have they gone to nyc.gov for help? How many community groups are pushing this when they should be pushing something else? I wonder about those in the middle class who are barely making it--who will be subsidizing them? Start teaching people how to build a career, how to find a job, how to transfer skills, how to study industry, and see what happens. Then there is the drama that surrounds most of these people's lives. give a man a fish... .

I work a corporate job and get a discount on my metro card as it is taken out as pretax. It seems unfair that people making a fraction of what I earn in jobs that do not provide benefits aren’t offered the same.

How about focusing on giving these families better jobs.....instead of one more bureaucratic maze and if these are one earner fast food employee families with 5 kids how about aggressively going after child support or releasing the fathers from prison for drug offenses so they can reunite with their families and support them. The disparity in drug arrests and punishment impacts the minority poor as documented in today's paper. Basically politicians seem to cater to the police and prison guards and the criminal justice system in preference to poor people. Of course police and prison guards and firemen and teachers do vote pretty much as a block....and their power in elections is apparent.

Why don't we sell Gracie Mansion to help fund it - so that DeBlasio - the ULTIMATE Limousine Liberal - contributes a little as well?!

DE Blasio is like Nero fiddling while Rome burns. He needs to put an end to the feud. Cuomo does too, so which is the bigger man?

He's a millionaire. Let him pay for it out of his own pocket.

No, half price MetroCards, without real and decades enduring improvements in NYC Transit, are a form of means tested welfare that would in time be used to diminish transit services for NYC overall; such services then being “mostly for the poor”. (Yes, Hillary Clinton was proposing such a change to Social Security in Oct 2015; this kind of thing drove voters to better candidates for the overall populace.) Now, a commuter tax, and a tax on those earning more than say one million dollars per year, could certainly fund better service and an overall decrease in the price of a MetroCard for all users. “The proposal, known as “Fair Fares,” would cover only the poorest residents, providing half-price MetroCards to people with household incomes below the federal poverty level, which is about $25,000 for a family of four.” It’s laughable that the Times thinks it can imply here that this $25,000 number applies to a family of 4 in NYC in 2018. That level of household income in NYC for a family is a desperation wage. So, again more out of touch with NYC reporting in the pages of the NY Times. Make that household income number, for a family of 4, about $60,000.

Those Metro cards will be for sale on the street faster than you can say SCAM. Or else they will be selling swipes for cash at the turnstile.

Wow, the comments here are telling, though sadly not surprising - liberals always stop their liberalness at income equality. For the record, NYC has become a Third World country precisely because the taxes on the wealthy have been so monstrously low. For anyone unfamiliar with history, the tax rate was near 90% on the highest income bracket under Eisenhower (a Republican), which contributed to the incredible investment in necessary things like education and infrastructure. Now after nearly four decades of letting the rich plunder our society, we have a highly uneducated public that is lacking not only in basic educational competency but also utterly without skills and unable to compete globally. The state of our subways, bridges and roads speak for themselves in terms of our infrastructure. Americans have been brainwashed into thinking trickle down economics works - and of course, it does work: for the rich. The country, however, has been reduced to a banana republic. It will take a bit longer for Americans to realize that this favoring of the rich at the expense of everything else is suicide for a nation. China, however, has long since figured this out and is proceeding accordingly. If Americans think they will be able to compete internationally with our horrible infrastructure and 4th rate education systems, they are deluded.

Conflating and comparing the issue of subsidized MTA subway fare with the planned expansion of the city-run ferry service needlessly confuses both discussions. The first is a debate about expanding current NYC-financed fare subsidies to students and others to low-income city residents generally, which should be judged on its merits as a strategy to reduce income inequality through targeted public spending; a municipal social program equivalent to federal food stamps, say. The second is a capital investment in the only part of the city's public transportation system that is wholly owned and operated by the city itself. The proposed $120m yearly over 5 years for expanding the ferry service sounds like a lot of money, but in urban transport terms it is minimal: equivalent to less than one percent of the MTA's annual capital budget for rail transit, for what will be a near-doubling of the ferry system's capacity.

lets give more reason for the wealthy to leave the city,l state etc, who already pay how much of the percentage of the taxes? A new tax to be administered by bureaucrats?

Thanks to the internet, it is increasingly easy to conduct business without having to be in New York. An increasing number of businesses are already moving large numbers of their staff to areas outside of tri-state area. My guess is that New York's taxes and obscene rents are pricing the city out of new and existing jobs. Within ten years, Madison Avenue, Wall Street and mid town Manhattan may very well be found in Miami.

You THINK these subsidies are ultimately helping the poor, but in REALITY you are allowing employers to keep wages low. Every subsidy (not just transportation) gives to the poor so their employers don't have to. This dependence on the government we've created is being taken advantage of by the employers--and to the detriment of the working poor. THIS is why nothing gets better after the government adds a new subsidy.

As if it's not undignified enough being poor in NYC, ought we really suggest encouraging these folk use our filthy, decrepit, unreliable subway?

At the very least, the Mayor should support system-wide reduced fares for everyone from midnight to 6AM, when riders are disproportionately poor and live in far-flung neighborhoods, and are already adversely affected by late-night and construction-related service changes. A small price to pay for the overnight workers who keep the city running 24/7.

The free-spending City Council ought to take a good look at Venezuela where the socialist policies of the late President Hugo Chavez have left that oil-rich country in complete disorder and ruin. If you think that this comparison is unfair, consider this: Twenty-seven percent of the City's annual tax revenues goes toward paying pension costs and the city's debt service and that amount is projected to grow. The NYC Housing Authority is estimated to need $25 billion in repairs. The city's jail budget has hit an all-time high despite having the lowest inmate population in 30 years. The City's hospital system has a $1 billion deficit. These are only a handful of the city's budgetary problems. Despite these problems, the City Council wants to address fare beating with more giveaways. The people who I see jumping the turnstiles every day contribute disproportionately to the disorder, begging, vandalism, and rubbish that exists in the subway system. They ought not be rewarded for their transgressions.

Wow. What incredibly deceptive spin this article is written with, from the title to the rhetoric. Shame on you. Deblasio is in favor of the reduced-fare cards. He even has a sensible, responsible plan to pay for the program. Half-priced cards are not being held hostage by a battle between two men that Deblasio is equally to blame for: they are being held hostage by Cuomo, following the orders of his rich friends.

These wealth redistribution schemes always work.

Do it already! For goodness sakes, it will help the poor in a city which is a playground for the rich. Quit lollygagging, and get it done, people need help.

Liberals love giving handing-outs to the exploited who deliver their food, watch their children, and do their nails. How about supporting strikes for higher wages? Changing zoning laws to permit high-density housing and tearing down those charming brownstones now worth so much money?

Tis a pity that all new revenue must come from a millionaires' tax. No restraints on spending, no cuts on waste and fraud. No wonder these gifted millionaires are leaving the city and state.

In Deblasio's world, if you're making over $75,000 (not a lot in NYC), you're a millionaire. He wants your money to buy votes.

A budget that subsidizes ferries servicing affluent neighborhoods, but fails to help the poorest New Yorkers access basic transit service, is a clear statement as to who the administration sees as being important to the city's future and who it does not.

Sure - let's follow the logical path - complain about the lack of funding - then rapidly cut revenues by gifting service to select groups of customers - rinse - and repeat - until suddenly every rides a 'free' subway.

Decreasing revenue and increasing ridership is exactly what the subway system needs.

With the many ways "millionaires" are already taxed one wonders at what point there is an exodus from NY City.

Every person - well, maybe Obama defied it to a small extent - who reaches summit like POTUS or MONYC - tends to have some blind spots and a stubborn streak that wouldn't be tolerated or tolerable if s/he had a boss. With deBlasio, it's "the millionaire's tax" as a panacea. I agree that it would be a good thing, and it's just one of the many casualties in the infantile spat between him and Cuomo. HOWEVER, one only has to walk in downtown Brooklyn or almost anywhere in Manhattan - perhaps, there are similar things happening in some or all of the other boros - to see that this city is awash with money. And, while "trickle down" is essentially the dubious way in which any but the top third will benefit, our so-called more than liberal mayor is presiding over 8 years of an out of control widening of the income gap. I'm not smart enough to know when some builder will get burned, but if they are confident that this or that 30 story building will make them richer, the city should levy fees that would free up funds equal to what the millionaire's tax would raise. Instead, the city spends money on things like builder-friendly infrastructure - while shortchanging the subways. In this context, not recognizing that subway and bus fares get in the way of employment for poor people is truly unconscionable. (Actually, I'm sure Bill recognizes it - he's just pretending that it's a bargaining chip. It isn't, and sacrificing poor people is altogether immoral.)

De Blasio is presiding over a ballooning city budget, an ever increasing affordable housing crisis, the subways getting worse by the day and his solution for everything is to cozy up to big real developers and a millionaire's tax which ain't gonna happen. New York City is not prepared for the inevitable rainy day.

Sure. Half price rides for the poor. Why not? But let's demand a pledge they remain free from drug use, tobacco use, and alcohol use, then random test to enforce under penalties of perjury. Why should taxpayers free up money for these alternative uses which in their turn add astonishing health care costs to the taxpayers' burdens. A much better idea is to raise minimum wage to a living level so each person can make his or her own economic choices.

Here's an idea, let the Governor have his way and declare victory for both sides. Everybody wins. The mayor looks good for doing the right thing. He doesn't concede much to the Governor but everything to the people.