The Internationalism

Internationalism No. 82, December 2025 Page 7 From the series Elections in the USA According to a February 13 th press release from the 5BORO Institute , a New York research centre, 42% of New Yorkers cite housing as their main economic challenge, and 78% say that housing costs have worsened in recent years. Democrat Zohran Mamdani's success in the recent New York City mayoral election was helped by his programme to tackle the issue of housing in the American metropolis. Voter abstention prevailed In 2020, New York had 8.8 million inhabitants, 7 million of whom were over the age of 18. Since about 85% of them are American citizens, it can be estimated that about 6 million were eligible to vote. To vote in the State of New York, you have to register, and in November there were 5.3 million registered voters in the city, 3.5 million of whom were Democrats. In this last mayoral election, two million people voted – about 33% of the el...

Internationalism No. 78-79, August-September 2025 Page 16 “Before Giorgia Meloni became Italy’s prime minister, she pledged to cut immigration. Since she has been in government the number of non-EU work visas issued by Italy has increased”. This is how The Economist of April 26th summarises the schizophrenia of their politics; and this is not only true in Italy: “Net migration also surged in post-Brexit Britain”. The needs of the economic system do not coincide with the rhetoric of parliamentarism. And vice versa. Schizophrenia and imbalances in their politics Returning to Italy, the Bank of Italy has pointed out that by 2040, in just fifteen years, there will be a shortage of five million people of working age, which could lead to an estimated 11% contraction in GDP. This is why even Italy’s “sovereignist” government is preparing to widen the net of its Immigration Flow Decree. The latest update, approved on June 30th, provides for the entry of almost ...