Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon and CEO of the aerospace manufacturer Blue Origin is pictured in a February file photo from Cape Canaveral, Florida. In an interview on Wednesday, Bezos skewered the leftist government of New York City. (Miguel J. Rodriguez Carrillo / AFP via Getty Images)
By Nick Givas May 20, 2026 at 11:00am
Amazon founder Jeff Bezos said Wednesday that if he ran his company like New York City’s government runs the Big Apple, packages would be late, delivery fees would skyrocket, and quality control would plummet.
The billionaire sat down with CNBC for an interview on “Squawk Box” and slammed New York City’s school system for poor performance.
“I’ll give you an example — the New York City school system,” he began. “They spend $44,000 per student — $44,000. That’s 30 percent more, per student, than other big cities like Chicago, L.A., and Boston. And it is three times more than Miami and Houston.
“By the way, New York City doesn’t get better outcomes,” Bezos continued. “Listen, let me just say: If we ran Amazon the way New York City runs their school system, your packages would take six weeks to arrive, we’d have to charge you a hundred-dollar delivery fee. And when the package did finally arrive, it’d have the wrong item in it anyway.”
Jeff Bezos on NYC spending:
“If we ran Amazon the way New York City runs their school system, packages would take 6 weeks to arrive, we would charge you a $100 delivery fee and when the package did finally arrive, it would have the wrong item in it.” pic.twitter.com/KzWrUBTcd5
— Geiger Capital (@Geiger_Capital) May 20, 2026
Bezos was initially asked about the topic of wealth and accused certain politicians of dividing America by using the “age-old technique of picking a villain and pointing fingers.”
“The problem is, that doesn’t solve anything,” he declared. “If you want to help the group of people who are struggling, you have to figure out real root causes and solutions, and that takes skill.”
When pushed about what he’d do differently to solve the country’s affordability issues, Bezos gave an example of a New York nurse living in Queens who makes $75,000 a year, but pays more than $12,000 in taxes.
“Does that really make sense?” he asked.
“People talk about making the tax system more progressive. How about we start by having the nurse in Queens not pay taxes, at all?” he said. “Why is a nurse in Queens who makes $75,000 a year paying more than $1,000 a month in taxes?”
The Big Tech CEO said average citizens like that shouldn’t be sending money to Washington, D.C. Instead, the federal government should be sending them an “apology.”
“We don’t have a revenue problem in this country,” he stated. “We actually have a spending problem.”
These comments came just days after it was announced that the Bezos family gifted over $100 million “to establish the Jackie Bezos Endowment for Early Childhood,” to help pay for youth-related education, among other programs in New York City.
Jackie is Bezos’ late mother.
The fund would be used to help New York City’s socialist Mayor Zorhan Mamdani fulfill his promise of delivering universal childcare to city residents, according to the New York Post.
Mamdani, who has consistently rebuked billionaires like Bezos, is facing intense criticism for overpromising on social programs despite a massive budget shortfall.
He was forced to beg state lawmakers for fiscal relief and was later called out by the New York Post after claiming he’d solved the city’s $12 billion deficit. The outlet reported on a mountain of hidden fees and accounting tricks within Mamdani’s plan.
“Critics called it ‘fake savings’ even after he ditched a wildly unpopular plan to hike property taxes by a whopping 9.5 percent,” the article stated.
“Banking on yet to be determined revenue-raising gimmicks and identifying fake savings are not wins,” a Democratic operative told the newspaper.
City Hall is reportedly planning to hike costs for ambulance transport, resulting in $25 million more per year, and will seek to charge users for EMS services, even if they aren’t taken to the hospital. In addition, police will focus more on handing out tickets to cars parked in bus lanes to increase revenue.
City documents revealed that the local government plans to use “funny accounting practices like shifting revenue from tree replacement fees from the city’s capital budget into the city’s expense budget were also tied to the savings.”
One insider said, “There’s not enough savings at all.”
“It is evidence of a new era of government in our city, one that can balance both ambition and fiscal responsibility, one that can invest in housing, child care, libraries, parks, schools and climate resiliency, while also cutting waste and finding efficiencies,” Mamdani said during a Tuesday news conference, the New York Post reported.
City Comptroller Mark Levine, however, said in a statement that the budget is still reliant “on $2.8 billion in one-time measures and $2.3 billion in short-term pension savings, without solving for the fact that city government continues to spend more than we take in, even in a year of record revenues.”
Mamdani’s budget is set to be examined by the city council as the two sides attempt to finalize a spending plan before July 1.
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