Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, Podcasts, radio News.
Speaker 2: You're listening to Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and
Speaker 2: tim Stenoveek on Bloomberg Radio.
Speaker 3: Now, many including those that are wealthy, are concerned about
Speaker 3: some of the priorities of incoming New York City mayor.
Speaker 3: Mumdani now weighing on this was one billionaire who does
Speaker 3: not call New York City home. We're talking about Citadel
Speaker 3: founder Ken Griffin. He talked about the city yesterday at
Speaker 3: a conference in Paris.
Speaker 2: I think that New York City is a red flag
Speaker 2: because people put aside good sense and common sense to
Speaker 2: luck somebody who is incredibly charismatic, who ran a really
Speaker 2: powerful campaign on social media, but who ultimately doesn't have
Speaker 2: the ability to deliver on the promises that he set forth.
Speaker 2: New York took a big set back during the Deblasio days,
Speaker 2: and I hope that Mondamie starts to think about how
Speaker 2: to pivot to a more thoughtful set of policies that
Speaker 2: will allow New York City to maintain its position. Not
Speaker 2: only is one of the greatest cities in America, but
Speaker 2: one of the greatest cities in the world.
Speaker 3: And that, of course was Citadel founder Ken Griffin there
Speaker 3: with Danny Berger of Bloomberg News. We want to get
Speaker 3: into our guest, Kathy Wilde. She is president and CEO
Speaker 3: outgoing president and CEO of the Partnership for New York City,
Speaker 3: which represents much of the city's corporate leadership. So we're
Speaker 3: talking about real estate developers, private equity firms, banks, many,
Speaker 3: many companies. Bloomberg LP, by the way, is a member
Speaker 3: of the Partnership for New York City. She's also the
Speaker 3: part of New York City Mayor Elect Zoroon Mum Donnie's
Speaker 3: transition team, and we have a lot of questions to
Speaker 3: ask her. Also with us is of course Bloomberg News
Speaker 3: senior reporter Miles Mine Miller, all of us here in studio.
Speaker 3: I told you as you sat down that we have
Speaker 3: about an hour of question So we're going to start
Speaker 3: and Kep, we'll talk fest, we will talk fast. Why
Speaker 3: did you want to be a part of the transition
Speaker 3: team for the Mayor elect of New York City.
Speaker 4: Well, I think to the point that Ken Griffin of
Speaker 4: Citadel just made and he's one of our members as well,
Speaker 4: and is a great corporate citizen of New York. In Miami.
Speaker 2: He has.
Speaker 4: He made the point about the concerns about the high
Speaker 4: expectations that Mayor elect Mom Donnie gave to his voters,
Speaker 4: and he, to his credit, brought out one hundred and
Speaker 4: seventy thousand new voters, mostly young people, in the primary.
Speaker 4: The cutoff age for his voter his voter support was
Speaker 4: forty five. So many of us are beyond that point
Speaker 4: and looking around and saying, oh, dear, does he have
Speaker 4: the seasoning to be able to do this? And I
Speaker 4: think that he's got the energy and the intelligence, and
Speaker 4: it's up to all of us who have a little
Speaker 4: more seasoning and to be helpful. And so that's why
Speaker 4: I joined the transition team and was happy to do that,
Speaker 4: and then working on the economic development workforce activities there,
Speaker 4: But in general, I think working with him to capture
Speaker 4: the enthusiasm and the energy. We came out of the
Speaker 4: pandemic very negative and we lost a million jobs, and
Speaker 4: then concerns about the cuts from the federal government on
Speaker 4: entitlement programs, whether it's Medicaid and health insurance, that there's
Speaker 4: the fight going on now. This casts a real pall
Speaker 4: over New York City, which is very dependent on those funds.
Speaker 4: So I think that what he's brought is a positive
Speaker 4: energy and we ought to capitalize on that, and hopefully
Speaker 4: he'll be the best marketer this city has ever had.
Speaker 1: Your role on the transition team, does it turn into
Speaker 1: a full time job in the Mamdani administration.
Speaker 4: I am definitely not at my age looking for a
Speaker 4: full time job. I'm trying to get away from.
Speaker 2: A full time because you're outgoing as president of the Partnership.
Speaker 4: I am outgoing and I do not plan to take
Speaker 4: another job. But I do plan to help the new
Speaker 4: mayor if he wants it.
Speaker 1: So beyond the transition period.
Speaker 4: Would as an advisor, well, I don't know in what capacity.
Speaker 4: As I say i'm there, I'm certainly going to help
Speaker 4: Governor Hokeel deal with her challenges. Where I've worked closely
Speaker 4: with her, She's done a great job, and I think
Speaker 4: we're counting on her to continue to manage New York's
Speaker 4: relationship with Washington and the relationship between the state and
Speaker 4: the city, which.
Speaker 5: Is very important.
Speaker 4: Our affordability problems will not get solved by the city alone.
Speaker 4: This is going to take federal, state, city cooperation, and
Speaker 4: so I think all of us who are committed to
Speaker 4: New York City in the future. We have to be
Speaker 4: thinking of all three levels of government and how we
Speaker 4: work with the leadership at all levels.
Speaker 5: You brought mum Donnie to meet with business leaders on
Speaker 5: several occasions. I wonder if you can talk about what
Speaker 5: his demeanor is in these meetings. Right, I've talked to
Speaker 5: Bill de Blasio about, you know, how he works a room,
Speaker 5: how mum Donnie works a room and really gets the
Speaker 5: business community to be comfortable around him. But we'll talk
Speaker 5: about some of these policy proposals that business leaders wanted
Speaker 5: answers to What are the things that business leaders said
Speaker 5: to him, Well, that sounds like a lofty thing that
Speaker 5: won't get done, or hey, that sounds like something that
Speaker 5: is much more than we're willing to back.
Speaker 4: Well, there's been quite an evolution since he won the primary,
Speaker 4: so in terms of his having a more nuanced position
Speaker 4: on a lot of the policies. You know, during the
Speaker 4: primary campaign there were whole slewer candidates and everything was
Speaker 4: one liners, and the social media stuff was one liners
Speaker 4: or you know, show and tell. When you get into
Speaker 4: conversation with CEOs, they want to hear data, they want
Speaker 4: to hear facts, and I have watched him evolve and
Speaker 4: grow over the last eight months where we had conversations
Speaker 4: last week, one on housing, one on childcare, where he
Speaker 4: was there with a pen and a notebook, taking notes,
Speaker 4: asking questions, and coming back with very substance to responses.
Speaker 4: So he has absorbed a lot and is now digging
Speaker 4: deep on these issues that you know, Ken Griffin expressed
Speaker 4: concern about the fact that he made a lot, you know,
Speaker 4: raised a lot of expectations, create a lot of idealistic
Speaker 4: notions out housing and childcare and how we can do
Speaker 4: all this for free. I think he's very quickly figuring
Speaker 4: out none of this is free. Raising taxes creates real issues.
Speaker 4: You may raise the rates of taxes, but that may
Speaker 4: not result in more revenues if you scare people away,
Speaker 4: or if you scare companies away, or as we've seen lately,
Speaker 4: we're seeing a real threat to jobs in New York
Speaker 4: for the first time, first time in my experience over
Speaker 4: fifty years, are seeing a decline in the number of
Speaker 4: jobs in our financial services industry. Scary thing. That's forty
Speaker 4: percent of our state income tax revenues. We don't I mean,
Speaker 4: these are you know, we've got to pay attention. And
Speaker 4: I think he gets that. But we've got to be
Speaker 4: at the table discussing these issues and helping figure out
Speaker 4: how to employers help solve the childcare problem.
Speaker 3: Kathy, you know, one of the things I think about
Speaker 3: and I remember, you know, being at milk and years
Speaker 3: ago and talking with very wealthy investors who said, yeah,
Speaker 3: it's about time we pay more taxes. So what is
Speaker 3: the balance? And I am curious among those folks that
Speaker 3: you talk to who are very wealthy, and a lot
Speaker 3: of times their wealth is not an income, it's assets
Speaker 3: and it's investment gained. What do they think, though, should
Speaker 3: be maybe more of their contribution. And I know they
Speaker 3: often contribute in philanthropy and so on. I know that,
Speaker 3: but I'm just curious, what is the balance of willing
Speaker 3: to pay more when again, I've had side conversations with
Speaker 3: folks are surprised that they aren't pay more in taxes.
Speaker 4: So what I've found and for somebody who's upper income
Speaker 4: earned income in New York, which is you know, our
Speaker 4: biggest taxpayers, we're paying fifty five percent of our income
Speaker 4: to the federal, state and city government with you all
Speaker 4: in so we're paying more more than half my paycheck
Speaker 4: goes to the federal government. So it's not like we're
Speaker 4: getting away with something for the very wealthy who are
Speaker 4: capital gains, et cetera. The big problem there is if
Speaker 4: they move their legal residents out of New York City,
Speaker 4: we don't get we don't share or get taxes. They
Speaker 4: aren't taxed here on the basis of their global income,
Speaker 4: and so we may get their a piece of their paycheck,
Speaker 4: but not their wealth, right, And that's a big question.
Speaker 4: It is. But what I found is over many years,
Speaker 4: when when business leaders and the big taxpayers are at
Speaker 4: the table and they see that number one government is
Speaker 4: doing what they can to figure out how do we
Speaker 4: offer the most efficient, the most effective services at the
Speaker 4: lowest cost possible. How do we make government more efficient?
Speaker 4: On the one hand, then so then you begin to narrow,
Speaker 4: so what's the delta in terms of what what do
Speaker 4: we need to raise revenues for? So, for example, when
Speaker 4: Dick Ravage in two thousand and seven, for Governor Patterson
Speaker 4: led the effort to figure out how are we going
Speaker 4: to pay to upgrade our subways which were falling apart,
Speaker 4: we supported and the business community supported creating a payroll
Speaker 4: mobility tax, where a portion of payrolls of corporations employers
Speaker 4: who were in the metropolitan region would go to that
Speaker 4: eighty two percent of the employees who work for our
Speaker 4: companies based in Manhattan take the public transit to get here.
Speaker 4: That was something everybody signed off on we supported. We
Speaker 4: supported an increase in that tax twice. Same thing with
Speaker 4: congestion pricing. We supported congestion pricing. Obviously a user fee
Speaker 4: where you get something reduced congestion more time in your day,
Speaker 4: is easier to sell, so it is not. And actually,
Speaker 4: when Mike Bloomberg was elected mayor right after nine to eleven,
Speaker 4: the city had to raise real estate taxes in order
Speaker 4: to rebuild and recover from the nine to eleven shot.
Speaker 4: We supported that eighteen percent tax increase in real estate taxes.
Speaker 4: So it's not that we're anti all taxes. Is government
Speaker 4: doing what they can to keep costs down, to be
Speaker 4: responsible in what they're spending. And then what is the
Speaker 4: contribution and how do we make it that makes the
Speaker 4: most sense, gets the most bang for the buck.
Speaker 1: Just very briefly, because you spent such a big part
Speaker 1: of your career working on affordable housing, I'm wondering if
Speaker 1: the mayor is sticking to freezing rent as his solution
Speaker 1: for affordability, because not one person that we have spoken
Speaker 1: to over the last few months thinks that not increasing
Speaker 1: supply and rather freezing rent is the right way to
Speaker 1: approach the affordability crisis with housing.
Speaker 4: Well, the new mayor is very well aware that those
Speaker 4: are not mutually exclusive options and that if there's no
Speaker 4: economic return, nobody's going to build housing. He's figured that out,
Speaker 4: so he has He has said really since pre primary
Speaker 4: that he understood the private sector had an important role
Speaker 4: in the supply side, and he was going to work
Speaker 4: on that. So I think that again his view is
Speaker 4: much more nuanced when he says now when he talks
Speaker 4: about freezing the rent, he says, and one thing that
Speaker 4: will enable us to do that is if we do
Speaker 4: reduce property taxes on rent stabilized regulated buildings. So he
Speaker 4: gets it. He can add and subtract.
Speaker 3: So can you come back, I.
Speaker 1: Said, you said, we had an hour, had an hour
Speaker 1: hour's worth of question, barely service.
Speaker 3: But we still appreciate Kathy, Thank you, good luck, Thank
Speaker 3: having Kathy Wilde, President and CEO of Going, President and
Speaker 3: CEO of the Partnership for New York City, part of
Speaker 3: the transition team of the New York City Mayor elect,
Speaker 3: and of course, our Bloomberg senior reporter Miles Miller