Why Zohran Mamdani won New York’s mayoral race: The revolt of the ‘struggling yuppies’

In a commentary, NTU Emeritus Professor of Economics Tan Kong Yam and Clement Chan, managing director of a Hong Kong–based boutique fund, noted that the downwardly mobile professional class - or “struggling yuppie” voters who are highly educated, culturally liberal but economically trapped - propelled Zohran Mamdani, a self-described socialist, to power in New York, the capital of capitalism. Their rise to political prominence reflects deep structural shifts in advanced urban economies, driven by persistent elite overproduction, soaring rents and limited housing supply, childcare costs outpacing wages, labour markets unfriendly to mid-career mobility, asset gains skewed toward older cohorts, and inflation in urban services.

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