New Yorkers collected $2.6 billion in welfare cash payments last year, city data shows

New York City doled out more than $2.6 billion in cash assistance to city residents in 2025, a Fox News Digital review of city records showed.

The money reached a record 864,999 people, a 30-year high not matched since before former Mayor Rudy Giuliani instituted major welfare reform in the early 2000s.

The $2.6 billion figure represents a 71% increase from 2022's $1.57 billion, data showed.

MAYORS WANT TO KEEP HANDING OUT FREE CASH AFTER FEDERAL FUNDS DRIED UP

When coupled with payments from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), the city paid out more than $7 billion in welfare to residents in 2024, according to a Fox News analysis of data from the city's Human Resources Administration (HRA).

The rise in welfare payments comes as some of New York City's wealthiest contemplate a Big Apple exodus due to what many have described as a policy environment unfriendly to businesses and moneymakers.

NYC MAYOR MAMDANI CALLS THREAT OF RICH PEOPLE LEAVING NYC OVER TAXES 'IMAGINED'

Billionaire hedge fund manager Ken Griffin notably threatened to put a major Midtown renovation on hold for his Citadel offices after socialist Mayor Zohran Mamdani targeted him by name in a video announcing a new tax on second homes in the city.

"When I ran for mayor, I said I was going to tax the rich … Well, today we're taxing the rich. This pied-à-terre tax is specifically designed for the richest of the rich," Mamdani said while recording a video outside the building that houses Griffin's penthouse.

"This is an annual fee on luxury properties worth more than $5 million whose owners do not live full-time in the city — like this penthouse, which hedge fund CEO Ken Griffin bought for $238 million."

Griffin called the video "inappropriate" in critical comments.

"What really upset me about the video was the fact that he put me in harm's way … And to put any citizen in harm's way is just inappropriate for one of our political leaders," Griffin said, also calling the video "creepy" and "frightening."

Though Mamdani inherited the state of his city's welfare system from his predecessors, his policy decisions indicate a continuation of the upward rise in payments.

The city's new nearly $126 billion budget that Mamdani and city councilors agreed to in June contains a $14.63 billion outlay for the HRA, which handles welfare and social services.

The 2026 budget allocated $11.97 billion for the HRA, giving the 2027 budget a social services earmark over $2.6 billion more than the previous year's.

The $14.63 billion for 2026 represents 14% of the city's total budget.

Fox News Digital contacted the HRA and Mayor Mamdani's office for further comment.