NYT can't let New York City's rich stay rich.

Steve Cuozzo

opinion

by Steve Cuozzo

Oh my god, New York City is hell out of reach for anyone but the rich! Now, why have I been reading and hearing things like that since I was a newborn baby, 73 years ago?

That's why, no matter how weathered the concept may be, because it's a good yarn.

Last week, the New York Times published an essay titled “Behind the Gates of the Private World of Only the Wealthiest New Yorkers,” taking us to its beaten streets.

Author Eliza Shapiro has fun joking about “private” laundry services, helicopter rides, and home IV drips to “cheer up” our tiredness and stress.

Her sample of the “A Tale of Two Cities” genre, which predates Bill de Blasio by about a century, is both funny in its own right and, appropriately, mildly infuriating.

But the underlying cultural and economic assumptions are simply infuriating.

The Times tells readers that their supposedly comfortable lives exist alongside the infinite firmament of the wider New York world of destitution, emotional devastation, and all-round misery. I can't stop the scolding.

Among Times journalists, privilege, no matter how hard-earned, is questionable at best and colonial, predatory, racist, and sexual at worst. The belief is that it is discriminatory and criminal.

If you can bear it, Mr. de Blasio has labeled not only the “rich” but also hard-working store and small business owners as blood-sucking insects preying on the masses and therefore deserving of constant regulatory harassment. I want you to remember your unconcealed contempt for this.

New York, or dreams of New York, have always been about excess. And for what is now called “inequality,” one might say, “Life is a bitch,” which might be a more sensible way of expressing it.

My favorite columnist, the late, great Pete Hamill, once wrote that the central reality of this city is that there are “very, very few people who are very, very rich and a lot of people who are very, very poor.” .

That was in 1973. It was true then and it is true now.

But there was and still is a great middle class of middle and working class people who, despite exorbitant housing costs, managed to get by surprisingly well without “concierge” medical care. ing.

The opening sentence of the Times essay, “New York City is a great time to get rich,” suggests that our current times are abnormal.

But when was it not a great time to get rich here? The Rockefeller family had a tough time during the Great Depression.

They built Rockefeller Center, right?

During Gotham's financial collapse in the late 1970s, movie stars, art dealers, tennis greats, models, and Wall Street heirs partied until the early hours of the morning at Studio 54, a burnt-out moonscape in the South Bronx. The scenery made a mockery of what today we would call “affordable.” There's a housing shortage. ”

Ah, but “the pandemic has changed a lot,” the founder of a national staffing agency told Shapiro. She had so much new business that she had to double the size of her company.

Of course, in the 1980s and '90s, 1 percenters like John and Susan Gutfreund eschewed such services and cheerfully pushed brooms around their penthouses themselves.

“A new class of private, members-only, concierge services is emerging as a kind of gated community within cities,” Shapiro writes.

However, there is a difference between a metaphorical gated community and an actual community.

Many of New York's progressive politicians and “advocates” are hiding behind their heavily guarded homes.

Jumaane Williams, a far-left public defender who hates the NYPD, was captured living in a townhouse on an Army base in Brooklyn. “He enjoys free 24-hour security,” the Post reported.

It's even been said that Mayor Eric Adams' “favorite hangout is the members' club.”

Like Mr. Shapiro, I deplore the recent proliferation of private dining establishments. But give that guy a break.

No matter how you look at it, Adams is spending less time with Zero Bond than he used to.

He goes to regular restaurants more than Rudy Giuliani.

He spent election night at an Italian restaurant on West 52nd Street.

He showed up last week at a regular steakhouse's opening night.

The ultra-luxury Casa Cipriani, located on the top floor of the Battery Maritime Building, is described by members as “a social club in the modern sense, where style, decoration, privacy and respect are still highly valued.” A spokesperson responded to Shapiro's questions about the list.

But this store clearly doesn't value its own customers.

Page Six recently reported that management is “purging” members in hopes of replacing them with “cooler clientele, higher profile people, like people in the art world.”

Now, isn't that rich?

scuozzo@nypost.com