New York City’s unemployment rate was 14.1% in September compared to 3.7% a year ago with the greatest job losses - at 223,100 fewer jobs - in food services and drinking places. That reality carries with it a very clear human cost. People need help.Īny type of quick, V-shaped recovery, where the metropolitan area rebounds like one of those bouncy balls, appears increasingly out of reach. census data - things are about to become worse. If the five boroughs were a frighteningly inaccessible place to live before - over 27 percent of Bronx residents were in poverty before the pandemic, per U.S. People seeking prime real estate on Central Park South simply need to shell out tens of millions, while those who seek affordable housing wait for years on a lottery-based queue.Īnd now, as the virus-battered economy continues to stagnate, hundreds of thousands of jobless workers, many of them in the hospitality industry, will have to continue to make do without their livelihoods or health care. Before COVID-19 hit, the average rental price of a Manhattan studio apartment was $2,842 per month or $2,593 in Brooklyn ( now $2,456 and $2,437, respectively). Bankers make untold sums while those earning the minimum wage can barely afford to get by.

Even without the fallout of the pandemic, New York is a deeply stratified and wildly expensive city.

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