NYC Considers 22,000 Job Cuts to Save $1 Billion, Mayor Says (1)

New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said the city is considering 22,000 layoffs and furloughs among its 326,000 employees to cut $1 billion of expenses after lockdown-related revenue losses.

De Blasio has projected a $9 billion loss in tax revenue over the next two years because of the pandemic. He presented his $95 billion budget in February, and that was reduced to about $89 billion in April after the coronavirus outbreak.

On Wednesday, he said the budget must be pared down to about $87 billion, and the city needs to find about $1 billion more in savings. The city may have to lay off or furlough workers, de Blasio said, if it doesn’t get fiscal aid from Washington or state authority to borrow $7 billion. The budget is due by June 30, the end of the city’s current fiscal year.

New York City turns over about 22,000 jobs a year through attrition, according to an analysis this month by the Citizens Budget Commission, a business-funded fiscal watchdog. If the city eliminated just 7,000 of those jobs each year, it could save about $1 billion through 2022, according to the commission’s calculations. Other cuts to programs and savings, such as consolidation of city procurement practices and employee welfare funds, could save hundreds of millions of dollars more, it reported.

(Adds recommendations of Citizens Budget Commission in fourth paragraph.)

To contact the reporter on this story:
Henry Goldman in New York at hgoldman@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story:
Flynn McRoberts at fmcroberts1@bloomberg.net

Stacie Sherman, Adam Cataldo

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