August 17, 2022 Austerity Politics: The Difference in Mayoral Leadership Lynne A. Weikart, PhD Introduction This book is a book about leadership. It is the story of how each of six New York City mayors since the 1975 fiscal crisis coped with state and financial interference. New York State government in close cooperation with the major banking institutions strongly asserted their power over New York City during the city’s 1975 fiscal crisis. Both state government officials and bankers created strong institutional structures that prevented the City from investing in its citizens in a myriad of ways – City officials no longer had control of its resources – institutions created by these two external powers did. By the summer of 1975, City officials could no longer sell its bonds in the bond market. Because the city had accumulated billions of dollars in short-term debt, it faced bankruptcy unless it could borrow the money in the bond market to meet payroll. Bankruptcy was not ...