00:00As our country has spent now close to 30 billion dollars on a war in multiple countries in the Middle
00:08East
00:08that has killed thousands of people, it is a war that is costing at least 500 million dollars a day.
00:16And the return on that is images of our country bombing girls' schools in Iran.
00:24And as we look at that, we have to remember it as part of the same conversation that we have
00:30about the struggles of working class people.
00:33Because the same amounts of money would be transformative for the lives of working class people across the city, across
00:42this country.
00:42And the choice instead to invest that kind of money in war is a choice that it doesn't just speak
00:51of a complete abdication of our political, economic, and moral responsibilities.
01:00It also speaks to a choice that will itself exacerbate this cost of living crisis and that we're seeing that
01:05already in this city.
01:07Now, our vision, when we speak about taxing the rich, when we speak about what we want this city to
01:13be,
01:14it's a vision of a city where working class people can do more than struggle.
01:19It's a vision of a city where we build on the successes of today and deliver something transformative for tomorrow.
01:25When I talk about making buses fast and free, it is as much an economic necessity as it is a
01:35necessity for the peace of mind of working class people.
01:38Because the anxiety that also comes with precarity is one that is often not measured.
01:43You were saying earlier, if we were to measure the time tax, we would see this inequality at an even
01:48larger chasm.
01:49And yet we see that time and time again, that this struggle to afford the most basic things, it has
01:56so many knock-on effects.
01:57Part of the reason that our city is putting forward our first ever city-run grocery stores, one in each
02:03borough,
02:04is also because we want to make it easier to live a healthy life in this city.
02:08We keep telling working class people to eat healthier, to live healthier, yet we don't reckon with the fact that
02:13it's cheaper to do the opposite in this city and in this country.
02:16So if we want better outcomes, we have to make those outcomes easier to pick.
02:20When we speak about this vision, it's a vision of an understanding that a city and a society has,
02:26that if we want to grow our population, if we want to grow the families of New Yorkers across the
02:33five boroughs,
02:34we have to make it easier to raise those children.
02:37So it's a vision as well where childcare is truly universal.
02:41We're proud of the fact that we have finally fixed universal childcare for three-year-olds.
02:46We're delivering universal childcare for two-year-olds, first time in our city's history.
02:49We want to continue that.
02:51We want to extend that to one-year-olds.
02:53We want to extend that to children as young as six weeks,
02:56because what we want is a recognition that for too long we have asked the working class of this city
03:03to bear with unimaginable costs,
03:06and then asked ourselves why the outcomes are not the way that we would like them to be.
03:10And I think even the examples that you mentioned,
03:14frankly, if we were to say those examples today as a reference of what we were aspiring for,
03:20we would be told that they were unrealistic.
03:22If we were to speak of CUNY today or SUNY today or Mitchell-Lama today
03:26or the rapid expansion of the subway system today,
03:29we would be told that goes beyond the possible.
03:31And we have to ask ourselves, why is it?
03:33And I'll say this also as a Democrat,
03:35that the ambition that we are looking for can so often only be found in our party's history
03:42as opposed to in the present or in the future.
03:47And I think to what you both speak of,
03:51we have to have a recognition that this is a global issue.
03:54It requires a global response.
03:56The proposal is the right one about an implementation of a 2% tax on wealth across the globe.
04:03And much like the climate crisis,
04:05we cannot allow ourselves to wait for a global agreement to take local action.
04:10And that's why it's so exciting to be here with so many, frankly,
04:15who have been on the front lines of this advocacy
04:16to ensure that we are creating a fairer city.
04:20And we're doing so by asking the questions of our tax system
04:24that we've so long been told that it's not even possible to question.
04:28And when we do question it, we realize, in fact, that it can be different,
04:32it must be different, and we're starting to make it different ourselves.
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